Nick Aldis, the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Champion has spoken about the reason for his ill-feeling towards WWE Executive Director Bruce Prichard.
Aldis was a guest on Konnan’s Keepin’ It 100 podcast where he went into detail about the reason for the heat between the pair. For Aldis, he took issue with Prichard’s comments on his Something To Wrestle With podcast.
Aldis explained:
“He said I was ‘playing the part of a wrestler and not really owning it.’ This is the part that is f*cked about that, so they’re talking about something from some Impact show, and it was when I worked with Alberto [El Patron],” Aldis recalled. I had actually left the company at that point. I just came back in to work with Alberto because I thought that was interesting to me, so I did it. Bruce says, ‘He doesn’t have the IT factor.’ Look, if he had just been talking about Magnus, the f**king Jo-Jo character from TNA when I was in my early-to-mid 20s, he probably would have been right.”
“Conrad [Thompson] then says, ‘Well, what about what he’s been doing with the NWA?’ He’s like, ‘He’s playing the role of a wrestler.’ If that was the TNA stuff, I would have been cool, but when he based it off, a, he hadn’t watched any of it, and b, he was just trying to f**king bury me. He went out of his way to take food off my table and f**k up my value in the market, and I don’t take kindly to that.”
Nick Aldis then discussed his experience of working with Prichard during Bruce’s time in TNA as Head of Talent Relations for the company.
Aldis continued:
“We had heat in TNA because my contract came up, and he tried to offer me a new deal. Basically, in TNA, anyone who hadn’t worked for WWE, Bruce basically jobbed them out and treated them like a jabroni. I’m starting to get a little bit of a push, and he’s trying to offer me a contract, but he tries to offer me the same money for three years.”
“I was 25 at the time, and I said, ‘You’re trying to tell me when I’m 28, you think I’m going to be worth the same amount of money I’m worth now? So why the f**k would I be here? Why would I stay if you don’t think I’m going to increase my value in three years?’ And he’s like, ‘Well, it was a good offer.’ So I did what anyone would do, I went straight to Dixie [Carter]. I just went, ‘If you think I’m going to be worth the same amount of money three years from now than I am today, then there’s no point in me being here. I might as well take my chances to go get signed by WWE or go somewhere else.’ She was like, ‘Whoa, wait, what are you talking about?’ Because this was always the problem there, guys would just go rogue and they would just do stuff without running it by her.”
Aldis then discussed Prichard’s reaction to Aldis going over his head and points out the hypocrisy he sees from Bruce Prichard with comments he makes on his podcast.
Nick Aldis explained:
“So Bruce got completely removed from the equation, and Bruce calls me up and is like, ‘Who do you think you are doing this and doing that? You’re just going running to mommy like a little b**ch,’ and I was just like, ‘Are you saying because the president of the company is a woman and that I went over to the president of the company that I’m running to mommy?’ I don’t think that plays very well in 2021. Those were his exact words.”
“This is the same guy who on his podcast will be like, ‘The top guys would go straight to Vince [McMahon]. That’s what the top guys should do. They should go straight to Vince.’ I went straight to Dixie but suddenly it’s running to mommy, and I was just like, ‘F**k this guy.’ My whole contract negotiation got taken out of his hands so much so that even when we were down to the wire and finalizing it, he tried to come and join the conversation again, and Dixie was like, ‘It’s fine Bruce. You can go.’ Of course he’s going to hold a grudge on that forever.”