Shane McMahon’s WWE Release: More Details on Royal Rumble Issues, Scrapped WrestleMania 38 Plans, Possible Return

Shane McMahon was let go by the WWE days after returning to WWE TV at the 2022 Royal Rumble event, and details surrounding what led to his departure have slowly started to make their way out. McMahon has not been a WWE employee for several years, so this was effectively his release as an on-air talent. Andrew Zarian of The Mat Men Podcast dropped a report shortly after the news broke saying part of the concern was how much McMahon changed around Bad Bunny’s plan for the Rumble, then Mike Johnson of PWInsider dropped a lengthy report with more details. 

While reports from earlier this week pointed towards McMahon wanting to work with either Bobby Lashley or Seth Rollins at WrestleMania 38, the latest plan was for him to be an onscreen heel authority figure for Raw and eventually have a match with Austin Theory (who has been working directly with Vince McMahon on TV recently) at Mania. Johnson noted the sequence in the Men’s Rumble that would have led to Shane vs. Rollins was scrapped. He was then pulled from Raw’s internal roster on Monday and was not backstage at the event in Cincinnati.

After confirming McMahon played a role in producing the Men’s Rumble match, Johnson wrote about how Shane and Vince butted heads over ideas for the booking — “It was said that Shane was obviously frustrated the day of the show and that some believed that came from his ideas being shot down by Vince McMahon.The talk was he was upset that ‘he wasn’t being allowed to do what he wanted’ and that he was ‘greatly preoccupied’ by his own role in the Rumble. The feeling among some is that Shane is taking the brunt of the heat for the poor reception to the Men’s Rumble match and that when the heat for that blows over, he’ll eventually return in some form down the line.”

McMahon previously left WWE in 2009 and began working on other business ventures, most notably in China. He returned to WWE programming in 2016 and worked as both a part-time wrestler and onscreen authority figure, flipping back and forth between face and heel. His last singles match was at WrestleMania 37 when he lost a Steel Cage Match against Braun Strowman (who is also gone from the company). Stay tuned for more details as they become available!