7 Released: James, Benjamin & Knox among them.

[CMWaters]

Damn...so much for a redo of the Katie Lea/Beth Phoenix ladder match from OVW.

Mickie...sucks about that, but she did have a good run while she was there.

Shelton...guess there is stopping him now.

[Widow's Peak]

I'm not shocked about Katie, although I am sad. She's a great talent who was woefully misused. Mickie is most likely a disciplinary firing, as I can't fathom why else they would can her.

No one else is a huge shock, although Shelton was a bit surprising.

[Deleted]

So was JWY wellness'd?

[xxshoyuweeniexx]

Apr 22, 2010 16:55:06 GMT -5 Lizuka #BLM said:

Apr 22, 2010 16:53:49 GMT -5 xxshoyuweeniexx said:

Beth Griffin, Nate Tail Yeah, and McCold are in the iMPACT Zone?

Never really cared for any of them. Though I will give credit to Natalya that she plays psycho lesbian well.

That's fair, but they're basically loads better than everyone else. I think they'll do fine carrying the division...eventually.

Mickie is just weird though. I guess they'll use Beth or Kelly's music for someone to give a crap about the Divas now.

[Chuckie Finster]

[Tapout]

Apr 22, 2010 16:49:17 GMT -5 Lizuka #BLM said:

Mickie's gone?

Well, there goes the only good female worker in the entire company.

Aside from the fact that Mickie isn't all that great of a worker, these other young ladies would like to have a word with you:

[ani]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Not Slam Master J!

[Deleted]

For the record, there is no chance in hell Reks survives this time.

[lionheart21]

Katie's gone?!!!!!

[Doley.]

none of them where THAT good.








except jimmy

[icansleep]

I could hardly believe it
When I heard the news today
I had to come and get it straight from you
They said you were leavin'
Someone sent you on your way
From the look upon your face I see it's true
So tell me all about it, tell me 'bout the plans you're makin'
Then tell me one thing more before I go

Tell me how am I supposed to live without you
Now that I've been lovin' you so long
How am I supposed to live without you
How am I supposed to carry on
When all that I've been livin' for is gone

[legendkiller]

Shelton gone? WTF? Well he would make a nice fit in the X division.

Shit.......

[Legion]

Apr 22, 2010 16:58:30 GMT -5 @tagteamspecialist said:

So was JWY wellness'd?

His Twitter comments made me think this as well TTS

[saintturgeon]

Apr 22, 2010 16:47:28 GMT -5 Richard said:

Wow, I knew there was heat on Mickie following the Euro tour but, damn.

What did she do?

[mike5286]

The only surprising release on here is Shelton i'd say the rest were expected.

[Richard]

Per PWInsider:

*Shelton Benjamin had been with WWE his entire professional wrestling career, an amateur standout who was signed by Jim Ross in 2000. Benjamin had been considered a future star with some excellent flashes of greatness at times, but always seemed hampered by how he was handled creatively as WWE seemed to try different comedic gimmicks that went against his natural talents. He had worked for all three WWE brands and was considered to be the type of talent who would have a great showing at times but didn't maintain it consistently. Of late, his former Team Angle partner Charlie Haas had noted in interviews, including one with this website, that Benjamin's deal was coming to an end. Haas had been imploring Benjamin publicly not to sign, hopeful they could reunite elsewhere. In one of Benjamin's last TV appearances, new World champion Jack Swagger scoffed at him, "You still have a job?" The vignette ended up edited off Smackdown. It may be a case that his deal has or will expire and they aren't coming to terms.

*Kung Fu Naki, long considered one of the most universally well liked performers by management and someone who was very good at promoting WWE's brand in Japan, had been with WWE since coming in as part of Kaienti in 1998. The Japanese group quickly became a comedy bit before slimming down to a tag team with Funaki and TAKA Michinoku. Of late, he had been used as a comedy figure, revealing his real name as "Kung Fu Naki" and having a short winning streak. He hadn't been used in many, many months, although he worked the Wrestlemania 26 Battle Royal. Funaki, who is fluent in several languages, also did some announcing work for the company in different areas. In many ways, his departure is the most surprising.

*Jimmy Wang Yang's second run with WWE began in 2006 following a run where he, as Akio, had some great matches on Velocity but was never pushed. A native Georgian, he returned in 2008 as Jimmy Wang Yang, playing a redneck Asian-American character which got over on the undercard, particularly during a tag team with Shannon Moore. He had mostly appeared in enhancement roles on WWE Superstars in recent months.

Slam Master J aka Ray Gordy, the son of Terry Gordy. He had been with the company a number of years, initially as one half of the Jesse and Festus tag team. The J gimmick came about as part of a comedy bit with Cryme Time but soon cooled off. He hadn't been used in a major role in some time.

*Mickie James was signed to WWE developmental in 2005 after a run in Ring of Honor. She was brought to the main roster as a Trish Stratus stalker and eventually became one of the company's top babyface females, holding the Women's championship five times and the Divas championship once. As we reported earlier this week in the PWInsider.com Elite section, there was some heat on James for conduct on the European tour as she caused several of the tour buses to be late. There was a feeling among some that given that she had just beaten a bad staph infection and was lucky to return in time for Wrestlemania, she should have been conducting herself a little more professional. Among some of the wrestlers, she was on their "most endangered" list after the tour. There had been heat on and off on her at different times for attitude, which some dismissed to me as jealousy over James' intentions to branch out outside the wrestling world with her education and musical aspirations. There was some unhappiness from the veterans' over her reaction to being moved to Smackdown last year as well. No one could deny her work in the ring and in a lot of ways, her departure is surprising as she had a strong connection with fans. She'll have an advantage over many released talents in that she has been using her real name the entire run.

*Katie Lea Burchill, who had been with the company since 2006 when she was signed to an OVW developmental deal. Although she stood out in OVW, particularly a feud with Beth Phoenix, she was never really used strongly on the main roster. Some of that was blamed on heat she received during her run for conduct on the road. She was brought up to the ECW brand as one half of a brother-sister duo with Paul Burchill. After a feud with Hurricane, the plan was to turn Paul babyface for Raw but instead he was released from the company. Katie made several appearances as a heel for the Raw brand but was never inserted into any storylines.

[casualobserver]

So does that mean Festus/Luke Gallows=Shawn and Jesse/Slam Master J=Marty?

[Tapout]

Apr 22, 2010 17:00:04 GMT -5 saintturgeon said:

Apr 22, 2010 16:47:28 GMT -5 Richard said:

Wow, I knew there was heat on Mickie following the Euro tour but, damn.

What did she do?

I heard she went into a restaurant and ate everything in the restaurant and they had to close the restaurant.

[TheDarkestKnight]

Apr 22, 2010 16:59:34 GMT -5 legendkiller said:

Shelton gone? WTF? Well he would make a nice fit in the X division.

s***.......

Shelton is above the X Divison. Hell Shelton could easily have some great feuds with Angle, AJ, RVD and Hardy in the main event scene at TNA.

Shelton has it all, just needs the correct storyline to elevate him to the top.

[notoriousjrh]

I know I link a lot of my articles on here (to the point where I think the mods may be figuring out how to kill me without it being traceable), but I wrote this back in October, and I think it sums up Mickie James and how badly she's being misused.

At least she's free now.

www.camelclutchblog.com/mickies-country/