As we reported several weeks ago here on eWn, WWE Superstar Mustafa Ali requested time off from WWE due to his wife giving birth to their third child. Due to this, he hasn’t been featured on SmackDown in recent weeks.
According to a report from Fightful, Ali’s time off request has now passed and he would have been available to work last Friday’s SmackDown TV tapings, which took place in his hometown of Chicago, IL.
While Ali was available for the show, the WWE creative team didn’t have anything planned for him so he obviously didn’t wind up appearing on the show. It should be noted that WWE also taped next week’s Christmas Eve edition of SmackDown last Friday and he did not appear on that show either.
WWE officials opted to send Ali home early for his paternity leave. He has not been on the road with WWE since before the Survivor Series 2021 pay-per-view event, which took place on Sunday, November 21st.
