When the first wave of future endeavors was announced, my initial thought was, meh, no real loss. Maybe Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows, but anyone with a pulse who follows wrestling knows they’ll be back in Bullet Club t-shirts by the end of the month in Japan, so they’ll be fine. It sucked for Drake Maverick and Sarah Logan who are/were in championship programs literally right now or weeks ago. And it also sucked for Heath Slater, who I figured was going to be one of those company lifers, and whose sole shirt was one that said I GOT KIDS | I NEED THIS JOB.
But really, it didn’t seem like anyone particularly consequential was axed from the company in light of coronavirus screwing things up. That is, until a second wave of future endeavors was announced shortly afterward.
Introduced Alexander Rusev, and then gradually shortened to just Rusev, he was always one of those guys that I was always high on since his ascent to the main roster. I appreciated that even in spite of being the archetypical evil foreigner, he showed a tremendous amount of respect for the ring itself and the business, and I loved the way he was originally built up, with a different face of the month being put in front of him, before he would ultimately meet them at the next pay-per view and then finish them with the Camel Clutch he called The Accolade.
Riding this burgeoning undefeated streak, Rusev would eventually capture the United States championship from Sheamus and hold it for several months, before having an eventual Wrestlemania program with none other than John Cena, whom he’d lose it to at the Showcase of the Immortals™, but not before having an epic entrance where he rode to the stage in a literal tank. Seriously, if this moment couldn’t be considered the pinnacle of his WWE career, then I don’t know what else could.
Either way, Rusev maintained a pretty strong presence for a while afterward, and even managed to turn face, when he for whatever reason, started christening every day as a holiday known as Rusev Day. I mean whatever, the fans ate it up, and it got him over, even if his win-loss record wasn’t nearly as sparkling as it was during his initial run.
Eventually, for reasons I don’t really particularly care to research beyond Wikipedia, WWE seemed to sour on him, and such was easily reflected in how he was treated on screen, if he was even allowed to make it on television. I’m going to guess there was some sort of contract dispute or something of the sort, and Creative basically took him to the woodshed with his character.
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