Zach Gowen had an interesting run with WWE as he was quickly thrust into the spotlight and he ended up working with some big names. But Gowen’s WWE run didn’t last long as he was only with the company for 9 months before he was released in 2004.
During a recent interview with Metro UK the former WWE Superstar acknowledged that he knew his release was coming because he had so much heat with other wrestlers, and with management.
“I definitely saw it coming because I had so much heat in the locker room with the other wrestlers and the office. I didn’t wanna get fired – I didn’t wanna quit! ‘But I was so immature emotionally, not only as a wrestler but as a human being, that I couldn’t handle the gift that was being given to me. I wasn’t equipped, I didn’t have the tools to navigate through that level of success successfully.”
Gowen went on to say that his identity was very closely tied to being a WWE Superstar, and his release from the company forced him to confront other personal issues.
“My identity at the time was wrapped up in being ‘Zach Gowen, WWE Superstar’ so if you take away the ‘WWE Superstar’ for me, what does that make me? That makes me a failure, that makes me not good enough, that makes me a disappointment I’m an addict and I’m an alcoholic. It’ll be something I deal with on a daily basis for the rest of my life, and I didn’t know it at the time.”
Zach Gowen also noted that he emailed Jim Ross about his issues and he was in rehab three days later.
“Literally within two minutes, I got a phone call from somebody in the office – Jim forwarded that email to somebody else in the wellness department. She called me up and they got me into treatment within three days after. That was February 14th, 2010 – which is the date of my last drink and drug.”
