The Organic Rise of Karrion Kross and WWE's Attempt to Silence It

The curious case of Karrion Kross and his apparent departure from WWE has dominated the conversation among wrestling fans for the past week.

That is to assume everything that has transpired so far has been on the up and up.

In light of recent events, it's fair to wonder whether what we're witnessing is a work or part of a storyline. If it's not, then it becomes a question of what went wrong, why WWE is in no rush to re-sign Kross and what would happen if he were brought back down the road.

It's been a banner year for Kross, but not because of championships or other on-air accomplishments. His 2025 started with his Final Testament faction being disbanded, with Authors of Pain and Paul Ellering being released, and his television time being limited to brief backstage segments.

Despite that, his crisp, self-produced vignettes, which were far more meaningful than anything he was involved in on Raw, caught the attention of fans online and earned him "internet darling" status of sorts.

His passionate, profanity-laced rant on the post-WrestleMania 41 recap show on YouTube got more fans excited than the widely panned Night 2 main event.

Instead of capitalizing on his momentum, WWE relegated him to a fleeting interaction with AJ Styles on the following Raw that ultimately amounted to nothing.

Occasional crowd chants of “We Want Kross” went ignored by management. Although his T-shirts sold out soon after being made available on WWE Shop, according to his interview with the Battleground Podcast (h/t Michael Reichlin of SEScoops), he was a background player at best.

WWE's attempt to silence his groundswell of support was presumably by design.

Kross being put in a program with Sami Zayn was originally an encouraging sign for his future, only for him to lose whenever it mattered most, including at SummerSlam.

Almost three years removed from their return to WWE in July 2022, both his and Scarlett's contracts expired on August 10.

Interestingly, Kross was mentioned on commentary during Zayn's match against Rusev on Raw, but otherwise, there has been little indication that he's under any sort of deal with the promotion at the moment.

How WWE could let a star with seemingly so much potential go has been strongly debated within the wrestling world in the days since, in addition to how it reached this point, the authenticity of the whole dilemma and the different directions it can go in.

Why Didn't WWE Do More with Kross?

Craig Melvin/WWE via Getty Images

At first glance, Kross checks all the boxes of what WWE would want out of a world champion.

The 40-year-old has size and a marketable look, not to mention his exceptional mic skills and character work. His in-ring ability has been his biggest Achilles' heel. He's competent between the ropes but hasn't had many memorable matches since first signing with WWE in 2020.

His NXT run was impeccable. He was prominently featured out of the gate, going undefeated for well over a year and winning the NXT Championship twice. His awe-inspiring entrance in particular made it clear he was being primed for significant success on WWE's grand stage.

His main roster debut couldn't have gone worse, though.

He was booked to suffer his first loss since joining WWE by Jeff Hardy in under 90 seconds without his wife Scarlett as part of his presentation.

The difference in Triple H's handling of him on the black-and-gold brand compared to Vince McMahon's vision for him on Raw was night and day.

It was all downhill for Kross from there. He was repackaged almost immediately and largely floundered before being released alongside Scarlett that November.

McMahon left his position as WWE Head of Creative the subsequent summer, and Kross and Scarlett were reinstated within a week of Triple H taking the reins from his father-in-law.

His involvement in the main event scene on SmackDown with Drew McIntyre and Roman Reigns gave fans hope he would stay there from that point forward, but that anticipated aggressive push never materialized.

Following a one-off win over Drew McIntyre at Extreme Rules 2022, Kross was not utilized at that level again. He settled into a midcard role and was given his own group in The Final Testament that failed to take off.

His biggest opportunity came during his recent rivalry with Zayn, but none of their encounters were anything out of the ordinary. In fact, virtually none of his matches in WWE stood out as special, and that could well have been part of the problem.

The booking is to blame as much as anything, but if Kross didn't deliver in the eyes of officials, that may have been a pivotal factor in why he wasn't re-signed, no matter how much merchandise was moved or how loud the reactions were.

Triple H, at least at one point in time, saw enough to bring him back in 2022. However, Kross revealed in an interview with Ariel Helwani on Wednesday that he hasn't had any communication with the WWE chief content officer since the start of 2025, when contract talks began.

He added that a contract offer was finally made early last week. After asking how the company came to the figure it did, he was given no answers, and the offer was rescinded. He said he wanted to continue having an open dialogue with WWE but conceded the entire ordeal was "weird."

In the end, Kross could go down as being just another example of a talented performer falling through the cracks due to the WWE and TKO conglomerate leaning more corporate these days and less family-friendly, and not taking the time to hash these things out well in advance.

The Dangers of Muddying the Waters Between Work and Shoot

We have entered an era of wrestling when it's becoming increasingly harder to decipher what's a work and what's a shoot. For better or for worse, WWE has blurred the lines of reality so seamlessly that fans question everything—and understandably so.

Sometimes, situations start out as real but are eventually incorporated into a storyline. R-Truth, who was actually fired by WWE at the beginning of June, was rehired within days and interfered in the Money in the Bank main event that weekend.

The freak injury Seth Rollins suffered on Saturday Night's Main Event in July looked legitimate, but it turned out to be a clever ruse to make his cash-in at SummerSlam that much more surprising.

PWInsider (h/t Randall Ortman of Cageside Seats) reported that plenty of people, both behind-the-scenes and Superstars, were upset with being "lied to" about Rollins' injury being fake, likely because it creates confusion in the future over whether they should believe what they're being told or if they shouldn't trust anything.

It's unknown which category the Kross debacle falls under and what the fallout will be.

In the interview with Helwani, Kross confirmed his contract expiring is real, but until he pops up in a rival promotion such as All Elite Wrestling, fans won't buy that this isn't part of a plan for him to come back to WWE imminently.

WWE is treading a fine line by "working" its audience and, more importantly, its roster to avoid spoilers in situations where it's unnecessary and there's little benefit.

A particular section of fans refuses to acknowledge any chance of it being real because it's nonsensical that he wouldn't be re-signed automatically. Granted, a majority of his matches never lived up to the hype, but he excels in virtually every other area, and there is value in keeping him on board.

The only way this works out is if, similar to what went down with R-Truth, WWE realizes it made a mistake by letting Kross go, offers him the contract he feels he's worth and turns it into an angle where he "invades" Raw and commands the attention of the audience.

Also similar to Truth, there has to be an appropriate endgame in mind.

Truth should forever be a member of the WWE family in some form, and whatever new contract he agreed to was obviously well-deserved. He ditched the comedy shtick upon resurfacing and it had fans excited for what was next, but it fizzled out.

Truth was never factored into WWE's plans, hence why he wasn't renewed in the first place and why he's treading water right now. Kross finds himself in the same boat, where if something massive was lined up for him, he wouldn't have been treated like an afterthought leading up to the expiration of his contract.

For every Cody Rhodes and Drew McIntyre who leave, reinvent themselves and return bigger and better than before, there are countless others whose second stint with WWE is equally as uneventful as the first.

WWE will always have the megastars it builds around and will rarely pivot from its plans, regardless of the regime.

Time will tell for Kross and where he winds up. He will be under the bright lights again sooner rather than later, but it may not necessarily be with WWE. Evidently, its quest to quell his organic rise backfired, and if it doesn't right its wrong, it's loss will be another company's gain.

Graham Mirmina, aka Graham "GSM" Matthews, has specialized in sports and entertainment writing since 2010. Visit his website, WrestleRant, and subscribe to his YouTube channel for more wrestling-related content.