Killer Kross on WWE main roster debut, release being a disappointment and a relief

Killer (real name Kevin, formerly Karrion) Kross and his partner Scarlett Bordeaux were Renee Paquette’s guest on the latest Oral Sessions, and they didn’t waste any time getting into the couple’s release from WWE last month.

Scarlett was surprised, but Kross said he had a feeling they might be getting let go. He also indicates that part of him was almost glad it was over.

“To be honest with you, I kind of felt like it was coming. I felt like the situation could have been recovered, with my presentation on the main roster... I felt like it could have been recovered. It’s fiction, and in the world of fiction, the possibilities are endless. But I was like, yeah, I had a weird feeling that night, just on the debut, I kind of feel like this is the direction it’s going in. It was like, a sense of disappointment, but it was also a sense of relief.”

Many fans also kind of felt it was coming from the moment the then-undefeated NXT champion debuted on Raw with a loss. Kross walked Renee through that, and how he tried to handle the situation:

“When I went up, and they asked me to do the match with Jeff and put him over, I was like, ‘Sure, that’s fine.’ I grew up a fan of Jeff, and ,me getting to meet him and him being cool was an awesome experience for me. He’s literally one of the coolest people I’ve ever met. So I was like, ‘That’s fine.’ One of the agents came to me and was like, ‘Hey, there’s a long-term plan for this so don’t sweat it — don’t worry.’ Okay, cool.

“I do my entrance and I get out there, ref comes to me and goes, ‘Hey, your 10 minute match is down to 90 seconds’ ... First time we’re working on television, we don’t really know each other in the ring, our rhythm. They come back from commercial and I’m trying not to laugh. If you see, if you go back and watch it, I’m smiling. Like closed mouth, trying to hold it back. As soon as Jeff got in the ring, I snatched him and I just called what we needed to do and that was it.

“But when I went back to NXT the next day, I spoke with someone there and I just said, I go, ‘Look, my biggest fear right now, my biggest phobia is that there’s a hole being dug for me, and I’m nervous that if I’m not permitted to crawl out of it myself and people absolve themselves of creating the situation — I’m not gonna be a return as an investment, I’m gonna to get fired. So, what do you think I should do?” Because part of this business is doing what you are told. My intuition was telling me that everything was off. Everything felt wrong, and I felt something bad coming four months before it happened. But everyone I would talk to was like, ‘Oh, no, everybody loves you. This is good, you have no problem,’ but I felt it coming. I tried to, as professionally, politely as I could, talk to people in the chain of command about that... I just tried to be a good sport.”

Bordeaux explained why she didn’t debut with her fiancé: WWE wanted her to wrestle in addition to being Kross’ manager, and then she busted an implant wrestling dark and Main Event matches. The pair then discussed the other differences between his NXT presentation and the infamous changes made on the main roster.

Kross: I got an email with what it was supposed to look like. Apparently, the music was supposed to change, the entrance was supposed to change, and this was supposed to be like an enhanced version.

Scarlett: Evolving something good into something different and better.

Kross: When I saw the picture of it, I showed it to her — and I just started laughing. I said, ‘I can be comfortable wearing this, but this is not gonna get over in 2021.’

Scarlett: It’s confusing because, why is the music that I’m singing — it’s still there. And then, there’s a mask there, but there’s no explanation. So sometimes if there’s one promo to explain why all of sudden he a mask on, why is Scarlett is still singing. But when there’s no explanation, people feel like they had something taken away. Versus, if it had been a new song and a whole new presentation, people would have been like, ‘Okay, this is new,’ but it just felt like an amputated version of what it was.

Kross: I look at it like this — nobody wants a reputation of being difficult to work with. Nobody wants a reputation for being a mark for themselves or not wanting to do business. Here I am, I for me personally had the dream experience in NXT. I walked in there, my ideas were embraced, we collectively collaborated on stuff... I felt inclined as a professional to embrace these ideas that were being given to me, because that’s all I was getting in NXT. If I had an idea, and I had something I wanted to say or I had an idea to I wanted to contribute to something, it was always met with enthusiasm. Or if they thought the idea was not great, they would make it better. So I thought to myself, ‘I kind of owe it to them to engage them with this.

Scarlett: We were also ready, when we signed up for WWE — we were like, we’re trading creative freedom to finally be able to have a steady income. We got our house because of WWE. We were so grateful to even have jobs during the pandemic when people we knew, I had family members who lost their jobs... and people were struggling on the independent scene. So we were so grateful for anything we were given. We tried to take that perspective no matter what. We were like, ‘It’s not our money, no matter what, we’re going to make the best of whatever it is,’ so that’s how we tried to take it.

Paquette asked about dealing with Vince McMahon’s team on Raw and Triple H’s team in NXT, and if there was interaction.

Kross: As it was explained to me, two separate entities. Like NXT really couldn’t interfere or expand, or even be involved with anything that was going on for main roster from a creative standpoint. Because I was transitioning, there was nothing that could be done, they just said, ‘Ask lots of questions.’

Scarlett: It is very much two different brands... and we were ready for that. I think we were confident in our abilities — promo work, wrestling-wise — we can get anything they give us over.

She didn’t even get a chance to help get the act over on Raw before they were fired in November. The pair already have some wrestling bookings, and Kross reportedly has some film work lined up. So perhaps it was all for the best.

Let us know what you think, and check out the entire new episode of Oral Sessions here.