Early Thursday morning (as far as North America is concerned), WWE held a press conference at the O2 Arena in London to announce the United Kingdom Championship Tournament, which will hit WWE Network in January. Part of that announcement included the introduction of Nigel McGuinness as the tournament’s official co-host and commentator.
McGuinness, a former Ring Of Honor World Champion, began wrestling professionally in 1999 and had a stint in TNA as Desmond Wolfe before retiring in 2011. Since 2012, he has served off and on as Ring Of Honor’s storyline “matchmaker” and commentator. This past weekend, ROH posted a storyline news post on their website that McGuinness had “resigned” as matchmaker. Reports indicated McGuinness was expected to spend a month at the WWE Performance Center as a guest coach, but it appears there were other plans, perhaps all along.
Mike Johnson at PWInsider reports that McGuinness wasn’t under contract to ROH and took this opportunity without telling anyone over there ahead of time. Ring of Honor officials are apparently “not happy” about Nigel jumping ship, so they hastily worked up the storyline explanation that they posted on their website.
After Thursday’s press conference in London, WWE uploaded a short video of McGuinness talking about his new role with WWE and what to expect from the UK Champion Tournament.
