So far, they have released Cathy Corino, Scott Armstrong, Ryan Katz, George Carroll,, Dave Kapoor, Ace Steel, Gabe Sapolsky Danny Burch, Hideki Suzuki, Timothy Thatcher,“Road Dogg” Brian James, William Regal and Samoa Joe.
The company released a statement following the release.
“With the continued evolution of NXT 2.0, we’ve decided to part ways with some of the staff based in our Performance Center. We thank them for their many contributions throughout the years and wish them the best.”
In a recent question and answer piece on PWInsider, Mike Johnson was asked if yesterday's NXT releases were some form of revenge against Triple H due to the fact that most people who were released were names that he hired while running the black and gold brand of NXT.
Johnson stated that while saying he couldn't 100 percent confirm that this was done as "revenge," he did point out that it was clear that almost everyone who was released yesterday was an important part of Triple H's NXT.
He went on to say it was a sad day throughout WWE and that there were "people in the company who rarely have empathy for others as they are out for themselves who were greatly shaken by what went down."
Regarding William Regal's release, Johnson believes the departure of Regal sent a message to everyone across the board that "no one is truly safe and should assume they will have a job for life."
In speaking to people within WWE, Johnson was told that they felt like "if Regal could be dismissed, what hope did they have of a long career there?" Johnson thinks the latest round of releases yesterday "put a lot of fear in the hearts of talents and staffers yesterday."
No one Johnson spoke to yesterday at any level of WWE were happy about what went down and were frustrated as they have no idea what could be coming next. It's truly a different time at WWE compared to years past, and many within the company aren't thrilled about it.