Swerve Strickland recalls a moment on 205 Live that convinced him the WWE Performance Center was “bullsh—ing him around.”
Strickland, who signed with WWE in 2019 and remained with the company until his release in November 2021, recently spoke with DJ Vlad about his frustrations. He felt WWE was trying to “backtrack” his progress, despite a standout match against Drew Gulak for the WWE Cruiserweight Championship in Miami.
“The one day I knew I was getting bullsh—ed around the PC was when I was there for like three or four months and I got called to do 205 Live against Drew Gulak, who had the Cruiserweight Championship,” Strickland said. At the time, 205 Live was taped following SmackDown episodes.
Swerve continued, “So, we had to go last on that night in Miami after you’ve seen all the stars. And it was me and Drew Gulak. We went 18 minutes in the ring straight for the Cruiserweight Championship. Everybody’s on their feet going crazy. I have ‘Swerve’s House’ signs, like, going after Roman.”
Rather than the standard “This is awesome!” chants, Strickland said the crowd was fully behind him. “They’re not chanting, ‘This is awesome!’ They’re chanting, ‘Let’s go Swerve!’ They’re actually rooting for me to win this title and I’m losing to Drew Gulak. Got great praise in the back coming afterward.”
He noted that several top stars, including Charlotte Flair, Bayley, Kofi Kingston, and Samoa Joe, praised his performance backstage.
“Everybody’s giving me crazy praise. I come back to the PC and they’re trying to teach you arm drags again. I’m like, get the f–k out of here with that. They’re trying to tell me how to entertain 400 people in NXT when I just entertained 6000 in the stadium. I’m like, why are you trying to backtrack me?”
Swerve Strickland says that he knew he was being “bullshitted around” in the PC after he had a killer Cruiserweight Championship match after Smackdown that had 6k fans going crazy and Samoa Joe, Charlotte Flair, Bayley, and Kofi Kingston gave him crazy praise after the match.… pic.twitter.com/IUEibwELtg
— 🅰️🅾️ (@KXNGAO) March 26, 2025
(H/T: Ian Carey and F4WOnline.com for transcribing the above quotes.)
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