WWE News: Former Tag Team Champions Released From Company
More than one year after rumors first suggested that they wanted to take their talents to another wrestling promotion, The Revival — Scott Dawson and Dash Wilder — have officially been released by WWE.
In a report shared on the WWE website on Friday morning, the company announced that it had come to terms with The Revival on their immediate release from the promotion. No further details were included and neither Dawson nor Wilder’s ring names or real names were specifically mentioned, as WWE simply concluded its news briefing by wishing the duo the best in their future endeavors.
With The Revival having technically become free agents following the news of their release, the general assumption is that the former Raw, SmackDown, and NXT Tag Team Champions will soon be heading over to All Elite Wrestling. As speculated by Ringside News, the language used by WWE in its announcement — specifically the part about their “immediate release” — suggests that Dawson and Wilder won’t be bound by a 90-day noncompete clause like most other wrestlers who get released by the company.
Prior to this new development, rumors had suggested that Dawson and Wilder’s contracts were originally set to expire this month. It was also rumored, however, that WWE extended Wilder’s contract by a few weeks to make up for the time he missed due to injuries, although it now appears that the company chose to disregard this by releasing both Revival members at the same time. Reports had also alleged last month that WWE had stopped paying the multiple-time former tag team champions, not long after taking them off television and removing them from Friday Night SmackDown’s storylines.
Effective today, Friday April 10, WWE and The Revival have agreed on their immediate release. Remember what they did in NXT & think about how deeply under-utilised they’ve been on the main roster. What a huge shame. Heading to AEW I should imagine pic.twitter.com/lyMVFBBPcA
— Gorilla Position (@WWEGP) April 10, 2020
As recalled by WhatCulture, the first reports hinting at The Revival’s unhappiness in WWE were published early last year, when the duo allegedly requested to be let go by the company on the January 13, 2019, episode of Monday Night Raw while still wearing their wrestling gear. It was believed at that time that Dawson and Wilder were dissatisfied with how they weren’t quite as relevant on the main roster as they were during their time in NXT.
While WWE would do its part to appease The Revival by giving them brief reigns as tag team champions on both Raw and SmackDown, the pair’s purported reluctance to sign contract extensions had allegedly resulted in the company giving them a comedy gimmick toward the end of 2019. Rumors had also hinted that WWE chairman Vince McMahon was never the biggest fan of The Revival’s decidedly old-school style of tag team wrestling, hence their relative lack of main-roster success.
