Former WWE Star Giovanni Vinci Addresses Release, 4 Second Loss To Apollo Crews

Published: 2 hours ago by Liam | Last Updated: 2 hours ago by Liam

Liam has been reporting & analyzing wrestling news for over eight years, and is currently the Managing Editor at WrestleTalk.com. Immersed in wrestling for 18 years, he has over 11,000 published articles in addition to leading and overseeing WrestleTalk.com's coverage.

Former WWE Star Giovanni Vinci Addresses Release, 4 Second Loss To Apollo Crews

Former WWE star Giovanni Vinci has opened up about his release from the company last year and his four-second loss to Apollo Crews.

Vinci was part of the May 2025 WWE releases, and hasn’t made any appearances or done any kind of media since then – until now.

In a new interview on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, Vinci, real name Fabian Aicher which he also used in WWE for a number of years, opened up about his release and the reason for his silence, saying:

“I just knew that after the call, because it was such a surreal feeling, man. It was like, on the one hand, it sucked that that chapter was over, because that’s what I wanted to do since I was 13 years old.

“But on the other hand, because it was such a roller coaster leading up to that, it felt freeing, in a way. I told a friend of mine, he asked me if I was okay. I said, ‘Yeah, man, I’m good.’

“It’s almost like when you’re in school and school ends and you’re going on summer vacation, just all the weight was off because at least I knew there was no more thinking about it.

“And really, after that, all I did was I just knew I was taking some time. Didn’t know how much it was, and, yeah, I didn’t think about how long exactly I was going to be out for.

“Just like, okay, we need some space. Take some time for myself, figure myself out, and yeah, enjoy life a little bit.”

WWE’s Missed Opportunity With Giovanni Vinci

In 2024, WWE removed Giovanni Vinci from Imperium and the idea was to reintroduce him with a singles character similar to his NXT 2.0 gimmick.

However, when he debuted with that repackaging, he lost a match in a matter of seconds to Apollo Crews and never recovered.

Talking about that match, he said:

“I thought the plan was to get me going right away, and I didn’t find out about that till basically the day of the show.

“So at the end of the day, you’re a professional. Whatever the plan is, you try to make the most of it.

“I do have to say, as far as entrance-wise, that was my favorite entrance I’ve ever done. Because in the group, I always felt a little bit like I tried to fit in. That’s why I didn’t stand out. Whereas with that character that I did in NXT, and it worked great there, doing that on the main roster, I just felt like, ‘Okay, I have some sort of direction, who I am, what I’m supposed to do.’

“Was my favorite entrance, personality-wise, charisma-wise and everything, and then the plan changed the day of.

“Looking back now, I feel like from a business standpoint, if you look at the positives, it definitely got attention, definitely got people talking. The unfortunate thing for me is just that not more came out of it, because I feel like we could have done a lot of cool stuff with that character on SmackDown.

“I know Apollo and I could have tore it up in a match. We did in NXT. We did on Main Event. We have great chemistry.

“It was just things just kept happening. We moved to a different channel two weeks after then the next thing happened. I wasn’t on TV for a little bit. And, yeah, that’s just one of those things that are a little unfortunate.

“Because I saw myself actually having really good matches with the guys in the United States title picture at the time, like Melo, LA Knight, Andrade at the time. I think we could have done some cool stuff there. But, yeah, it is what it is.”