We reached out and spoke to Lars Sullivan (Patreon)

Fightful reached out to Lars Sullivan, and actually heard back from him when the news dropped on Tuesday. He confirmed the release happened, and was surprised WWE didn't announce it themselves. He chalked it up to them being nice about them, and was very complimentary of how they handled his departure, saying they did it with "compassion and honesty."

Sullivan informed us that he told WWE he was done with wrestling after battling crippling anxiety issues to the point of struggling to eat during days of TV filming, and was having trouble sleeping. He also lost his father last year, which compounded a rollercoaster year for him. Sullivan called himself his own worst enemy, and owned up to multiple issues that prevented him from gaining traction in what he called his dream job.

Sullivan told us that he's likely done with wrestling, and again took responsibility for the issues that led to that, calling some actions "idiocy" and "his own selfish behavior."

We spoke with him about his WWE run and he was grateful for the experience. One person in WWE told us that they saw his shirtless promo with Michael Cole as "sabotage, but if it was a test, he passed it." Sullivan himself said he liked doing the promo and saw it as them looking to add more depth to his character. He was given specific instruction to breath heavy through my nose and the verbiage.

A point that was hammered home was that he was treated well by both the WWE office and a locker room, and it wasn't a case of bullying.