During his interview with Chris Van Vliet, James Ellsworth revealed that he was originally scheduled to beat Heath Slater at Summerslam. Here’s what he had to say:
They were doing this thing where Heath Slater didn’t get drafted by RAW or SmackDown. So, the major idea that never happened was, originally, I was going to wrestle Heath Slater at SummerSlam and the winner gets a SmackDown contract. I was going to win! That was the original idea to bring me in. Then, Heath started getting over as a babyface doing that.
So, they’re like, ‘Ah, you’re both babyfaces. We can’t do that.’ I got bummed out because I only had the Braun Strowman match.
Credit: Chris Van Vliet. H/T WrestlingInc.