New details regarding WWE’s issues with Covid-19 in 2020

Ariya Daivari, who was recently released from WWE, appeared on the Straight Shooting podcast and talked about how Covid-19 affected WWE’s television production in 2020…

“The whole reason 205 Live got moved back to NXT is because NXT was having a little bit of a COVID issue compared to the main roster. A handful of guys were getting coronavirus and this was around the time where nobody really knew exactly how serious this was. They are having a COVID issue in NXT and I believe someone on the main roster got infected. Word got out and it basically boiled down to, ‘NXT is giving main roster guys coronavirus.’ I forget who I was going to wrestle but we were going to do an episode of 205 Live at the ThunderDome and all of a sudden they came up to me and were like, ‘We’re changing the card. These three guys gotta go.’ They kicked some NXT guys out of the locker room and sent them home because this is when we were still in Orlando for the ThunderDome.”

“Me and Isaiah Scott had to do a 15-minute match on 20 minutes notice. He was wrestling someone else, I was wrestling someone else, both of our opponents got sent home, so we put this match together. After that, what I was told was Vince [McMahon] was like, ‘No more NXT guys on the main roster during the pandemic.’ Guys were just coming up to 205 Live. He said, ‘No more NXT guys in the locker room.’ I was told NXT was having too many cases of COVID and Vince didn’t want NXT guys in the SmackDown locker room because they might bring COVID.” (quotes courtesy of Fightful.com)