What’s the story?
Simon Gotch, now known as Simon Grimm, was recently interviewed by For The Win. While speaking to FTW, Gotch touched on quite a few topics including his tenure with the WWE as well as his future.
During the interview, Gotch also spoke about the “catering” incident that had transpired a day before his release from the WWE. The incident had been rumoured to be the reason behind his release from the company.
In case you didn’t know...
Simon Gotch has had multiple issues backstage during his time in the WWE.
Gotch was a part of “The Vaudevillians” tag team alongside Aiden English. After Gotch was released from the WWE, rumours sprung up that there was an incident involving him at the post-WrestleMania 33 edition of SmackDown LIVE.
Several rumours also pointed towards Gotch having had an altercation with his tag-team partner Aiden English.
The heart of the matter
During the interview, Gotch completely denied the rumours of him having an altercation of any sort with English. Further, he spoke about the catering incident. Gotch clarified that the incident happened at WrestleMania itself and not during SmackDown LIVE. He was quoted as saying:
“The actual story is that it happened at WrestleMania. I was sitting in catering and the chair I was in was kinda flimsy. I go to shift in it and it just collapses underneath me. Being a ham, my immediate reaction was to demand someone pin me. ‘Someone pin me quick.’ The guy who comes over, I think he works for us. I didn’t realise he was a local technician and was not a WWE technician.”
Gotch further clarified that it was just a joke on his behalf and that the local technician didn’t go along with it:
“He was someone who worked on the set at ‘Mania. He came to help me up and I’m like, ‘Nope, you gotta pin me. C’mon, man.’ And he’s not going along with the bit. He thinks I just fell and he’s trying to help me. I see the bit’s going nowhere so I take the chair and I just kick it off to the side, drop it like a little punt and let it lay where it lands. That was it. I saw the story online, saying that I fell in the chair and made this big scene and was yelling and screaming. No part of that is accurate.”
What’s next?
Simon Gotch has now changed his name to Simon Grimm and will be working with independent wrestling promotions. He hasn’t announced plans of joining any of the big promotions such as NJPW, ROH or Impact Wrestling yet, although they might well be in his future.
Aiden English, on the other hand, is rumoured to be in line for a push now that Gotch has been released from the company, putting an end to their tag team together.
Author’s take
If Gotch’s words are to be believed, then the incident really wasn’t all that it was cooked up to be. It appears to me that it was just an attempt at a practical joke (and a rather lousy one at that) that the technician didn’t get.
It is possible that Gotch’s reaction could have been misconstrued as “bad behaviour” by backstage officials, however, I believe that his release didn’t come as a result of this incident, but was something that the company had probably planned quite a bit in advance.
I hope to see Gotch/Grimm succeed in the independent scene.
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