The WWE creative team has already been given a list of wrestlers not to write ideas for as they will be unavailable for the foreseeable future, starting with next Monday’s three-hour episode of Raw. Dave Meltzer said in today’s Wrestling Observer Radio show that the company will indeed be suspending some main roster talent within the next few days. Drug testing took place at shows over the weekend, in addition to yesterday’s Raw.
Further confirming that some suspensions will be taking place is that it is standard company protocol for head officials to inform creative that certain performers will not be available for the foreseeable future. This fact was publicly disclosed by World Wrestling Entertainment in Henry Waxman’s report concerning steroids in professional wrestling released this past January.
Although, there is a lot of skepticism among many in WWE these days in regards to how the company is handling drug test violations. Since the fall of 2007, the official policy on drug test failures has been to publicly announce all failures no matter what, but internally, some believe the company isn’t completely abiding by its own set of rules.
For instance, of the four confirmed developmental releases within the past two days (Lupe Viscara, Jon Cutler, Dakota “Maverick” Darsow and Kafu), two were reportedly let go as a result of drug test failures. It is rather peculiar that WWE officials opted against publicly outing the violators when it is company policy to do so.
Early last year, WWE announced the suspensions of developmental wrestlers Derrick Neikirk and Neil “Chet the Jet” Bzibziak, releasing them shortly thereafter. In this new case, the company appears to be circumventing its own set of rules by quietly releasing talent so more unwanted negative attention isn’t drawn to WWE concerning drug use amongst its wrestlers — especially due to little known minor league talent when the company is adamantly trying to clean up its image. Had they not terminated the violators in question, they would have had no choice but to publicly announce their respective suspensions, hence the quiet releases, which apparently is WWE’s new way of getting around the policy.
— Regarding Vickie Guerrero’s decision to legitimately quit World Wrestling Entertainment, for the record, she handed in her notice to the company about a month ago. Coincidentally, or perhaps not so coincidentally, this is right around the time they started having Santino(a) Marella direct various pig-related insults towards her on television. While there were a few light-hearted jokes concerning Guerrero’s physical appearance here and there throughout her near three-year tenure in the company, she was never treated this harshly up until a few weeks ago.
— The term “FCW Universe” is now being used amongst commentators Josh Mathews and Dusty Rhodes during developmental’s weekly Florida Championship Wrestling television show. The move was apparently sudden as a few weeks ago during a show, there were about a half-dozen or so references to the term when it had never been used before.
