There are folks who have rationalized some of the recent WWE releases by making note of the fact that wrestlers who had previously asked for their release were part of the cuts. Mike Kanellis was one of those wrestlers.
In an interview with WrestleTalk, he explained why this wasn’t something he wanted right now:
“So, I mean in the sense that in my head it was always like if there is going to be releases, it’s probably going to be me and probably going to be my wife, just because my wife has been out on maternity leave and they were doing anything with me. I had already asked for my release in the past, but we did work things out after that. I didn’t want it to happen during a pandemic. I think that’s a hard thing to explain to people, not to go off topic, but there are a lot of people who are like ‘well he did ask his release’, which I did, but my wife never did and I want to get that clear, my wife was happy to stay there. But it’s like, you thinking’s the back of your head, yes I did ask for my release, but no one wants to be released in the middle of a pandemic. You ask for your release when you think you can go and do other things. I asked for my release because I wasn’t working and I wanted to work.”
Kanellis wasn’t being used often while Maria had missed significant time while pregnant and taking care of her children. They weren’t surprised by the decision but it doesn’t make it any easier to lose your job in the midst of a pandemic that is making it nearly impossible to find other work anytime soon.
That shouldn’t even need explaining, but there you go.