Damian Priest Says WWE Have Been ‘Forcing Him To Take It Easy’ This Year: ‘I Need A Lot Of Work Done’

Damian Priest notes that he currently needs ‘a lot of work done’ due to accumulated injuries.

In 2025, Priest has had a stop start kind of year, from feuding with Drew McIntyre in the first half of the year before moving on to a program with the returning Aleister Black on WWE Friday Night SmackDown.

While speaking on Delivering Happiness, Priest was asked about the WWE superstar schedule, noting that he has been taking a little bit of a break this year.

“Yeah, fortunately, a little less for me lately. This past year, I’ve taken a step back, been banged up a little bit. So kind of giving the bones and joints and ligaments and everything in between a little bit of a break. But no, no, I would say- but it’s still a weekly travel thing. We’re on the road every week. I’m just not performing five days in a row like I used to.”

Priest would continue, noting that he needs a lot of work done, but would rather not worry about it until he needs to, with WWE forcing him to ‘take it easy’ this year.

“It’s unfortunate and I don’t like to bring it up too much, and I don’t take breaks. Since I’ve been in WWE, I’ve literally taken zero days off. I’ve never asked for time off because I’ve been hurting. The company now this year decided, let’s take it easy on him, cause I’ve been going hard for a while. I tore my shoulder a couple of times within the last year and a half. My knees are banged up. My back is, oof. I need a lot of work done, but I choose to not and because if I don’t have to, I won’t, and I’ll just, you know, I’ll figure it out. Like, let’s do rehab and just keep me in the game, coach type of thing. So we’ve been doing that for a while. But this year, I think the company was like, ‘OK, we’re happy with you, but we need to make sure you’re going to last here.’ So they’ve been forcing me to take it easy, put that way and you know, not the easiest thing to do.”

Elsewhere in the same interview, Priest shared how Rhea Ripley pitched the Terror Twins’ recent reunion. You can read more about that here.

If you use any of the quotes above, please credit and link to the original source with a h/t and link back to Fightful for the transcription.