Former WWE Superstar Brian Kendrick had requested his release from WWE and it would seem that his release came just a few days ago before what would’ve been his AEW debut on Wednesday’s Dynamite, despite that being completely derailed by some pretty controversial comments Kendrick had made years ago that surfaced online, causing AEW President Tony Khan to pull Kendrick from Dynamite. Kendrick has since gone on to apologize for his actions, but it is too little too late as the damage has been done.
The Wrestling Observer Newsletter reports that Kendrick was actually granted his WWE release back on December 14th, 2021. You may recall his release was granted by WWE before his last WWE appearance on NXT, when he was attacked Harland and thrown down a flight of stairs. Kendrick would challenge Harland to a match, saying if he lost the match he would quit the company. The match was set for NXT, but it didn’t happen due to a travel issue stemming from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic with Kendrick. Therefore, the match was canceled and Kendrick was (in reality) now gone from the company.
Since Kendrick was under a contract with NXT, that meant he had only a 30-day no-compete clause. Since his release had been granted back in December, that gave AEW enough time to scoop him up for a potential working relationship but that wasn’t meant to be based on Kendrick’s antisemitic remarks.
