Once upon a time, World Wrestling Entertainment would have yearly purges of their roster. WWE released superstars annually after WrestleMania.
In recent years this has not been the case. The return of the brand split (Raw and SmackDown having separate rosters) means that the company is in desperate need of talent. There hasn’t been a mass exodus from the company in quite some time.
The announcement this morning, however, breaks that streak. Emma, along with Darren Young and Summer Rae, were released from WWE, which, to be honest, surprised not one person.
Emma was a phenomenal athlete in NXT. WWE repackaged her on the main roster, however. This occurred so many times that the audience never got to connect with any of her gimmicks.
Darren Young was a great tag team wrestler. The Prime Time Players delivered good matches and promos. Unfortunately, Young never quite won the audience over as a singles competitor. Bob Backlund may not have been the right manager to have paired him with.
Summer Rae improved quite a bit during her time with World Wrestling Entertainment. But with the influx of talent like Charlotte Flair, Sasha Banks, Bayley, Asuka and the like, performers from the previous era like Summer, Alicia Fox, etc, have an uphill battle ahead of them.
It is quite a shame that the WWE never was able to get the most out of these three competitors, especially Emma. Emma proved that she can have great matches with the best of the best. Her promos in NXT weren’t that bad. Could the stilted overly scripted main roster promos have done her in, as it has so many other performers who were great in NXT but floundered on the main roster?
As always, the WWE, at the end of these statements wished these performers the best of luck in their future endeavors. We at The Scrum Sports wish them the same.
