WWE Wanted to Use Matt Cardona's Pool After They Fired Him

Cardona stood up to his former bosses
Photo Credit: WWE.com

Being a multi-national provider of sports entertainment in near-monopolistic fashion can make the egos of those running said entity swell up to solar proportions. It's the attitude that allowed them to fire Drake Maverick, ask him to work the Interim Cruiserweight Championship Tournament, and then use his tearful reaction-to-firing video as part of an angle to try and make them look like a benevolent benefactor giving him another job in NXT. Vince McMahon and Paul Levesque just have massive amounts of hubris to think that they can call up anyone they want to take their time or their resources to use without promise of any long-term benefit. They escape any consequences of hubris just because wrestling, though improving, is still a hub for bootlickers, people who don't know their own worth compared to what they really mean to the capitalist superstructure.

All in all, Matt Cardona, as Zack Ryder, felt like as much a company man as you could be without breaking through the brown ceiling like Seth Rollins, Braun Strowman, or The Miz seemed to have. Perhaps that feeling was based in how little he seemed to speak out about his role being cut, how he responded to his original flare in popularity being used to light the torch for yet another John Cena vs. Kane match by begging to get back on TV with song called "Hoeski" rather than saying things on social media. It all seemed to ignore that Cardona originally lit on fire because he was the squeaky wheel who desired grease every week on YouTube. Just because he seemed to quell it and preferred to talk about his action figures probably didn't mean he had any less frustration.

You can fool a lot of people, especially headstrong executives who think that unless you were fired because you threw Ultimate Warrior-levels of fits, you could be called upon to be at their beck and call after release. Cardona must have had the office hook, line, and sinker, because they expected him to say yes when they asked his girlfriend, Chelsea Green, to ask him if he would let them use the pool at his house to advance the OTIS/Mandy Rose storyline. As one should've expected in retrospect, Cardona was furious at the suggestion. Those craven asswipes couldn't even ask him directly, and they had the nerve to ask him to set up a camera crew at his house to use his pool after firing him despite him giving them everything they supposedly want out of a wrestler. In a funny twist to all this, Cardona, who relayed the tale on friend Brian Myers' (fka Curt Hawkins) podcast, said that shortly after, Miz and John Morrison were due to come over to hang out, and they, without knowing WWE's request, asked if OTIS could come with them. Cardona recognized the happenstance even after suspecting it was a rib, and obviously, he doesn't have an issue with the big man.

So now you have more of an insight into how entitled capital, especially this certain company that seems to embody all the worst aspects of it, can be. WWE has so much cash on hand right now that it could literally light a million dollars on fire and still be on pace for a record-breaking year for revenue and profits. Yet, when the time comes for it to spend some money on the things that make it the worldwide leader in professional wrestling sports entertainment, the pursestrings tighten. Not only do wrestlers get the cut, they are expected to provide afterwards. I don't know how much money Drake Maverick was making before he was fired, nor do I know right now what his new contract pays him. I do know developmental deals, with little exception, pay peanuts comparatively speaking, and that the salary probably wasn't worth the expectation of labor after the firing or the exploitation of his emotions in the process.

The same goes for Cardona. Whatever money WWE was willing to pay him to use his pool, if any, was not worth the hassle of having the production crew come on and pile on the emotional strain of having fired him from the only job he ever really wanted so that Vince and Stephanie McMahon, Paul Levesque, Jerry McDevitt, and Kevin Dunn could all make their wallets fatter. Good on him for standing up to WWE. Though, I'm not sure I'd expect Cardona to start joining the revolution and posting leftist polemic like this was some kind of awakening. After all, he seems to be one of the few who remembers when people wanted to Join the Force:

What about GFW??? https://t.co/gtlU07Diee

— Matt Cardona (@TheMattCardona) June 8, 2020