It’s been a few years since fans have seen Wade Barrett wrestle a match in a WWE ring, as he parted ways with the company in 2016 after WWE release him early.
The company made an effort to keep him, but during an episode of Colt Cabana’s Art of Wrestling podcast Barrett explained that he told WWE officials “I f**king hate it here” when he was offered a new deal.
“I left [the WWE] around April or May of 2016. I told them that my contract was coming up, and I told them that I wasn’t re-signing. They tried to make a couple of offers, and I told them ‘It doesn’t matter what you offer me, I need to leave. I f–king hate it here.’ I loved my job until, probably, the end of 2014, beginning of 2015. I did some exciting things and some not so exciting things…I thought if I kept improving my physique, and I got ripped, that’ll convince them. Maybe, I need a catchphrase. Maybe, I need a t-shirt that’ll be a big sell. Maybe, I need to do more with my in-ring skills. There was always something in my head like I can improve this and I can improve that.”
The former Intercontinental Champion went on to say that after a few years with the company he felt that it wasn’t rewarding anymore because he realized he was just waiting for a thumbs up from Vince McMahon.
“By the time I got to 2015, I was sliding down the card. I was getting opportunities that I thought were kind of wasted. Like, I became the King of the Ring, which sounds like it should be impressive, but what it was followed up with was zero rises. It was like ‘What are we going to do with these guys today? Ah, just have them wrestle for three minutes, and have this guy [Stu] go over…’ Suddenly, after putting in all that effort, I had to climb up the card and get to where I wanted to be. It wasn’t rewarding, to say the least. It was a realization that it didn’t matter what I was doing there, I’m just waiting for one man to give me the thumbs up or thumbs down. I’m spending my whole career waiting and hoping that I get a thumbs up.”
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