The latest guest on Insight With Chris Van Vilet was new IMPACT play-by-play commentator Tom Hannifan, who spoke in detail about his time in WWE, as well as his reaction to getting released back in 2021. Highlights from the interview are below.
His reaction to being released by WWE:
“It was a shock and it was a surprise. It was an emotional and heart-breaking day, but this is a business, it’s budget cuts, and the pandemic has hit a lot of different businesses in a lot of different ways. I kind of understood how things were going, Adnan Virk was brought in in April, then they made the move to Jimmy Smith. I saw the way that things were going but that’s just business. It took me a while to separate my personal feelings from what happened to a business standpoint.”
When he feels he was first given a big opportunity in WWE:
“I would say it was the first time that I got called up to SmackDown, in retrospect I had no clue what I was doing, I had no idea what I was in for. I thought it was just calling a match, but there are so many layers to this. Thankfully the powers that be gave me a lot of opportunities to fail and to grow. I think that’s something where people just look at success, but no you need to fail and mature to get better. I feel like I was a success in WWE.”
Whether he kept up with IMPACT during his time in WWE:
“It was kind of 50/50. I was legitimately a fan, I grew up a fan of The Motor City Machine Guns, Samoa Joe, I loved the X Division. I remember Magnus’ World Title run being a big heel run. It was all these experiences where I had seen this show before, so it was just fun. I got a lot of people tweeting me saying I was fed stuff, but no, I did a lot of research.”
Full interview can be found below.
