Last weekend an ECW tribute show headlined by Bully Ray and Matt Cardona took place, with D-Von Dudley scheduled to be in his former partner’s corner. However, it was later reported D-Vn was pulled at the last minute because WWE was unhappy with the promotion using WWE’s intellectual property. And subsequently, it’s been reported by Dave Meltzer in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter that when D-Von reached out to Triple H to get permission because he’d given his word, he was threatened with losing his road agent job if he attended. With the apparent reason being WWE was concerned D-Von could get hurt if he were involved in anything physical.
He went through John Cone in talent relations who reportedly approved of the booking and he believed based on his contract, since he’s not a wrestler, that he was able to do things like that. Bruce Prichard nixed the booking and it ended up on the desk of Paul Levesque. Hughes has said he was going to do it because he gave his word on it and Levesque didn’t give approval and he was basically told if he did it, he’d be fired, so he didn’t do it. There was no real reason past the claim that they didn’t want him in a physical risk, but I’m not sure how much physical risk there is in pulling out a table since he was not scheduled for any physicality himself.
Dave MeltzerD-Von would only have been on the show in a non-wrestling capacity, as ten months ago, he revealed he’d had his spine shifted and now has screws and a plate in his back. Consequently, even a minor bump could endanger his long-term health. In addition, three years ago, he had to be operated on after suffering a stroke. Thankfully, though, it appears he didn’t suffer any ongoing severe effects from that, and perhaps down the line, WWE will relax their stance concerning him attending shows as he is a grown man capable of making his own decisions.
