Vince McMahon Shot Down Scotty 2 Hotty’s Ideas For WWE Performance Center

Scotty 2 Hotty was one of the mainstays of WWE’s Attitude Era and also during the Ruthless Aggression Era. After getting released by the company in 2007, he returned as a trainer at the WWE Performance Center in 2016. However, he would request his release from the company a few months ago.

The former WWE Superstar gave his all as a coach for developmental wrestlers in NXT and made it clear he loved his time there. However, Scotty 2 Hotty also hated walking on eggshells in NXT 2.0.

While speaking with Fightful, Scotty 2 Hotty talked about Vince McMahon paying him a visit at the WWE Performance Center. Hotty recalled how McMahon shot down his ideas as well.

“So, he came to the Performance Center one time the whole time I was there. Maybe six months ago. I was always the guy in the talent meetings, or any meeting in life, I would sit in the back row not wanting to be seen. He came there, he gave a speech and I was like, ‘You know what? I’m gonna sit in the front row and I’m gonna be the first one to ask a question because I feel like I have a legitimate question.’ [Because we’re] always going out doing these tryouts for all these athletes—NFL, Major League Baseball, everything but bowlers and golfers, pretty much, they’re hiring.

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So I said to him, and I had this idea for a while where Broadway is shut down. All these live shows around the world shut down, right? All these performers are out of work, so I said to Vince—I asked the second question—I said, ‘We’re always doing these tryouts for the athletes. Is there any thoughts to doing a tryout specifically designed for these live theatre performers?’ Because I can remember going to see Lion King on Broadway and there were all these dudes swinging around up on the stage, they’re shredded. They look like athletes, they were probably athletes at some point in their life, got hurt and then fell into theatre or maybe they just looked like an athlete. That’s what we do; we’re performers who react to off crowds.

So you would take these people who look like athletes, but they understand the importance of the theatrical part. Because sometimes that’s a hard thing to teach, say, a football player who’s been taught, ‘Hey, just win, win, win, win, win, get that ball in that end zone. You don’t worry about the crowd.’ Whereas somebody who’s done a show every day, two shows on the weekends, they might understand,” Garland stated. “So I said, ‘Is there any thought to doing an open tryout for these people?’ His answer was, ‘We are not actors. We react.’ I was like, ‘Okay. I guess that’s dead in the water,’ even though we have acting class and promo class and bringing in acting coaches…we’re not actors.”

WWE’s mass releases also took their toll on Scotty 2 Hotty. Scotty 2 Hotty previously squared off against Joey Janela at Game Changer Wrestling’s ‘Die For This’ show. We will have to wait and see what is next in store for the former WWE star.