Grayson Waller Felt He Was Going To Be Released After New Day Left WWE

At the beginning of May, New Day (Kofi Kingston & Xavier Woods) announced that they would be departing WWE. The duo had been aligned with Grayson Waller on television, but weren’t prominently featured on a week-to-week basis.

Waller lost to Oba Femi on the April 21 episode of WWE Raw, and disappeared from TV until showing up at NXT at the end of July. Waller called out the NXT roster and aired his grievances, leading to his current run as NXT Champion.

Speaking to Chris Van Vliet on Insight, Waller was asked if he felt he was close to being released by WWE prior to his NXT return.

“100%. I could feel it, especially when the New Day left. I could feel it because when the New Day left, Oba destroyed me. He’s a very big man, very strong, and just beaten Lesnar. So I think he was very confident going into that match. Maybe I wasn’t prepared enough for Oba Femi, but then when I didn’t do anything for like another month, was not a great position to be in. I’m smart enough to know; I’m not going to pretend. I’m real enough to know. I know I have a lot of value to the company, but in that position, there’s other people who could also add that value. So I had to do something because I’m not going to sit back and let my dream disappear. If I didn’t do something about it, that would upset me if I didn’t do something,” he said.

Waller won the NXT Championship at NXT Heatwave.

He is set to defend the title at NXT Halloween Havoc against Tony D’Angelo.