During a recent interview with News18 Sports, Drake Maverick commented on his WWE release and it not being a storyline, returning to NXT, and more. You can check out some highlights from the interview below:
On how his getting released wasn’t a storyline: “When everyone goes on about it is a storyline; oh they have turned it into the storyline well – Guys, it’s my life, it’s not a storyline. And I never questioned creative, I was as I would every week – I get my text on what I am doing and I would show up do my job and go home. It was never any more than that and I did my job as a professional. Now, I could have handled this very differently and been very upset with being let go or turn up and show my professionalism in spite of what was going on and continue to do a very good job and work hard and show them that, ‘Look at the hard work I was doing and you have made a mistake.’ Also, no one was in a situation I was in. Nobody has three appearances in primetime real estate on NXT, nobody had that but me. So I had to do something and my mindset was that I was going to show them they have made a mistake and the world what I can do; because if WWE was not interested in doing business with me still, someone else would.”
On being GM for 205 Live: “I really enjoyed being the GM. And I learned so much from a professional aspect with the team I was dealing with – the head writer of 205 at the time is now one of the head writers on Monday Night RAW – so things I learned from him, prepared me for things going forward. Like what the company expects – how they expect your delivery, what they want your delivery to be, what the cadence of a GM is. This was something I had not done before and I learned so much. I would put in a position where I’d have to watch every match and I’d be biting to get in there because I am not retired, but no one here in WWE had seen me in the ring; so a lot of time it was – from a backstage point – who is this guy? I know what I am doing, and I practice each week and it was just having that inkling that I wanted to get back into the ring, but that role was one of the most favorite roles that I have ever done, it really was.”
On 205 Live being a great place to hone your craft: “(Chuckles) ‘Give cruiserweights a chance’. I think everybody does not remember stars like Cedric Alexander, Mustafa Ali, and countless others have passed through 205 and have gone on to be amazing stars on RAW and Smackdown. I would say 205 is a great place to horn your craft, a great place to learn the ins and outs of wrestling TV and also you get to be seen a lot quicker with the higher-ups in WWE. When we were on the road we used to be on RAW and then after Smackdown. The people that did Smackdown show were still around to watch 205 Live and the very important eyes be like, ‘hmm, I remember the Premier Athlete Tony Nese, hmm. I remember Ali, I remember Cedric, and maybe something can be done with them here’. You know that connection they develop with the audience, it does rub on the people watching. I would say 205 live has been a success and helped propel many of the guys careers in WWE.”
