Corey Graves got the wrestling world talking when he tweeted that he was told he wasn’t famous enough for a spot on Raw or SmackDown, and that’s why he went to NXT starting last week.
Graves tweeted, “Imagine chasing your dream. Then being TOLD (not deciding) that you’re no longer physically able to pursue your dream. Then you dedicate your life to something “dream adjacent” and being pretty fucking awesome at it. And then, when it’s time to enjoy the fruits of your labor, being told you’re not famous enough for your own job. Just in case you’ve wondered where I’ve been.”
He was expected to be back on the main roster this fall once Pat McAfee starts his ESPN College Gameday duties again. Graves wasn’t used on this week’s show. The belief is that Graves was legitimately unhappy about being bumped off Raw and Smackdown for the NXT assignment.
While speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer noted that some people in the company think Graves tried to get fired with the tweets, which have since been deleted.
Meltzer said, “Everyone in WWE that I’ve talked to said it wasn’t an angle. He hasn’t been fired yet…..I’m gonna say this is September-ish, maybe early October. I just remember when they first made the announcement of the announcing changes and that Pat McAfee would be back and everything. Basically, when Michael Cole had moved to SmackDown, but it was only gonna be temporary, and Joe Tessitore was starting with Raw, and we were told it’s only temporary, he’s gonna be moved to SmackDown. At the time I was told that the Raw announce team would be, in January, Michael Cole and Pat McAfee, and the SmackDown team would be Corey Graves and Joe Tessitore. Maybe a couple of weeks ago, not that long ago, I just kinda asked, ‘So is it Joe Tessitore and Corey Graves that are gonna be the hosts of SmackDown?’ since that’s what I had already been told. And the answer was, ‘To be determined. It’s not determined’.
Now, I guess it was a couple of weeks ago when Corey Graves got the word that Wade Barrett was gonna replace him on that show, and he wasn’t happy. I don’t know if he got the word he was gonna start in January in NXT. I don’t know the situation there. I just know that that’s when he found out that he wasn’t gonna be on SmackDown as he presumed he would be. He was genuinely unhappy.
“Now, why you would go on Twitter and do all this? I can’t answer that question. There’s people there who think that he was trying to get fired and that’s why he did it. If he was trying to get fired, they probably aren’t gonna fire him because I don’t think they want him going to AEW if they give him a release. They could also suspend him, which maybe they’ve done for all we know. It doesn’t have to be announced that they’ve suspended him.”
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