Luke Harper recently asked for his release from WWE. Apparently, the company will not be granting him the release. In fact, they tacked on an extra six months to his contract for the time he was out with an injury. His contract was initially set to expire in November.
Wrestling Observer Newsletter‘s Dave Meltzer reports that Vince McMahon told Harper, in writing, that his release would not be granted. He was initially set to work a program with Sami Zayn after WrestleMania 35. However, it was later decided that the program would not be done. One person close to the situation revealed that Harper needs to get out of the company because the decision was made not to use him after Vince McMahon saw his return.
Vince reportedly said he didn’t “get him” and complained that Harper couldn’t even do a southern accent. It should be noted the southern accent thing was a complaint Vince had about four years ago. Harper was regularly pitching ideas while he was out with an injury, but each of them were turned down. He wasn’t booked for anything other than Fan Axxess prior to WrestleMania, however, out of nowhere, Vince wanted to know why he wasn’t in the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal.
This explains why he was a last-minute addition. The match was a complete mess as Braun Strowman, who won the match, forgot his spots, which is why he hasn’t been doing much on TV. As for Harper, he was booked to begin the Zayn program the day after WrestleMania. However, after WrestleMania, he was told that he was no longer needed for TV, and went home. He was called for a match with EC3 on Tuesday, and was basically used to test out the EC3 and Drake Maverick pairing as a wrestler and manager duo.
The agent in charge of the match set up a bunch of manager spots, all of which Vince hated. The creative meeting that was held the day of the WWE Draft included someone asking about which brand Harper would be on. Vince said that the guy can’t even do a southern accent, complained about his match with EC3, and decided he wouldn’t be put on either brand. Harper then asked for his release.
