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Near the end of the 11th of June, the WWE announced via press release and then via Twitter that Bruce Prichard would be taking over as the creative head of both Monday Night Raw and Friday night SmackDown. This meant that Paul Heyman was being removed from his role as the Executive Director of Raw with immediate effect. The press release stated that “Paul Heyman will concentrate on his role as an in-ring performer.”
While reactions to this on social media have been mixed to negative, it is said to have had a stronger negative backstage where one source told me that not many of the newer wrestlers had worked much with Bruce Prichard and were nervous about the change, especially given the popularity of Paul Heyman.
SportsKeeda have learned via a high up WWE source that one of the reasons behind this change was apparently due to Vince McMahon no longer having the XFL to focus on. Vince McMahon would state in a conference call after the Executive Director role was created that he was intended to spend less time focussing on the day to day duties that the Executive Directors would be taking up. I was able to learn more about this, which I reported on August 21st.
Paul Heyman has been removed from his Executive Director position
I have been told that due to no longer focussing so much time on the XFL, Vince McMahon has taken a much more hands on approach that he has done previously. Many sources have reported over the last 9 months that Vince McMahon has been spending less and less time at Raw and especially SmackDown. His heightened activity during the COVID-19 pandemic has apparently put extra pressure on creative roles and have resulted in a number of disagreements. The source added that they did not know that this were coming but were not surprised to see it happen.
While we do not know as of yet what Paul Heyman’s position is, or whether this may have been a resignation from the role, we do know that Heyman does not currently have an on screen role. With Brock Lesnar expected to return around SummerSlam time, this could result in greater on screen responsibility for Paul Heyman or a more imminent arrival than first expected for Brock Lesnar.
It is my personal hope that Paul Heyman returns to a creative position sooner rather than later as multiple members of the talent pool and creative/production teams have made it clear to me how much they have enjoyed working under him.
