Over the weekend, WWE finally released Luke Harper and Sin Cara, both of whom had publicly asked for their release (a very long time ago, in Harper’s case) as well as the Ascension (Konnor and Viktor), who didn’t ask for their release as far as we know (but they may have done so privately, and nobody would blame them if they did). Months of a supposed “release no one” policy at WWE was finally brought to an end late last month when ACH/Jordan Myles was released once it became clear he would never stop tweeting.
Naturally, in this era of increased competition in mainstream wrestling, the first question on everyone’s mind when releases do happen is what company the released performers might go to next, and how soon we might see them there. The Wrestling Observer Newsletter has confirmed with WWE that the newly released Harper, Sin Cara, Konnor, and Viktor all have 90-day non-compete clauses. That means they can’t wrestle for another company until early March of 2020. That seems like a long time right now, but it’s not so bad in the grand scheme of things.
Personally, I’d really like to see Luke Harper in AEW. While I agree with those who say that AEW should take everyone who WWE releases, Harper seems like a clear exception because he’s such a great worker and has so much personality, there’s a lot he could do there. Sin Cara will most likely work in Mexico, and probably the U.S. indies as well. Konnor and Viktor could be fun in NWA, if they want to keep that “face paint and should pads” tag-team tradition alive.
For now, we’ll just buckle down through the Winter, and see how things shake out when Spring draws near.
