Nick Aldis knows why Mickie James was buried in her return to Raw

After missing more than a year due to injury, Mickie James finally returned to WWE television on the Aug. 17 episode of Raw. But WWE didn’t exactly roll out the red carpet for her. Her match against Natalya was overshadowed by Seth Rollins bickering with Samoa Joe at the commentary table to push an unrelated angle, and then James lost via count out.

Nick Aldis, the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Champion and husband of James, was asked about Mickie’s return on the Battleground Podcast. Aldis clearly believes Mickie was booked that way because of Bruce Prichard’s personal vendetta against Aldis. He began with a strong dose of sarcasm:

“You’re not suggesting that the Executive Director of a publicly traded company with stockholders and huge television rights fees to maintain would be as petty as to devalue one of his own assets just to get revenge over a response to a feud that he himself started, would you? I mean, you really can’t honestly suggest that that would be a real thing. I mean, it has to be a coincidence....[Mickie is] only a surefire Hall of Famer, multiple time champion across multiple promotions, ground-breaker, half the women’s roster there basically decided they wanted to be wrestlers because of her.”

Aldis then gets more serious and explains that fans are smarter these days and see through Prichard’s nonsensical booking:

“You guys are a perfect example of the overall sentiment to that. Times have changed. The fans have their own opinion, have their own voice. These sort of silly, petty, kind of tactics and things, they see through them these days. I don’t think anybody saw that and thought, ‘Oh man, Mickie James is a jabroni.’ Everyone saw that for what it was. She’s as good as any woman there is. She’s an all-time great, and she doesn’t need me to fight her battles for her, that’s for damn sure. Ultimately, she knows her worth, and she can make anything work. I think everybody in the world can smell that stench...It was just sad.”

It’s worth noting that James was booked much better (Aug. 24) this week on Raw, where she took out both Natalya and Lana by herself after they trashed her on the mic.

Do you think Aldis is right about Bruce Prichard allowing his personal beef with Aldis to influence Mickie’s booking during her return to Raw?