More on Roderick Strong’s Departure from WWE & Signing with AEW

As noted before, Wednesday’s AEW Dynamite show in Sunrise, Florida featured former WWE NXT talent Roderick Strong making his official debut for AEW.

Fightful Select reported that prior to his departure, WWE had been “dead silent” about Strong’s status in the company for the past several months. WWE officials reportedly had considered an idea at one point of having Strong work as a coach for their developmental system through the remainder of his deal but it is not known if this idea was ever pitched to Strong himself.

It was reported that when Strong had signed a new deal in 2021, WWE officials had originally planned for him to be the focal point of a re-vamped NXT Cruiserweight division for their NXT brand. These plans reportedly changed significantly following Paul “Triple H” falling out of power from the NXT brand. It was reported that a similar thing ended up happening for the original plans for Strong’s Diamond Mine stable in NXT as well.

In regards to Strong requesting and being denied his release in 2022, it was reported that those spoken to stated that they had believed that his contract with the company was to run into next year. It was also reported that this was something that they have yet to confirm or deny from their sources.

2K officials reportedly had been informed by WWE officials to exclude Strong from the planned roster for their WWE 2K23 video game.

Talent spoken to reportedly stated that they had not been informed by WWE officials of any update regarding Strong’s status in the company but did stated that he had not been seen at WWE’s Performance Center in quite some time.

In regards to Strong’s ankle injury status, it was reported that those close to Strong stated that he was doing well physically and had recently been medically cleared to wrestle again.

In regards to AEW, it was reported that several AEW talent spoken to stated that they were pleasantly surprised when they learned that Strong would be joining the company. Strong reportedly is well liked by most in the wrestling industry.