WWE Originally Wanted To Hire Andre Chase As A Coach, He Chose To Take A ‘Much Lower’ Salary To Sign As A Wrestler

WWE

Former NXT star Andre Chase has revealed WWE originally wanted to sign him as a coach instead of as an active wrestler.

Chase officially joined WWE in early 2021, and had a run in NXT as the leader of the popular Chase U faction that lasted until this past April when he was released.

Now using the name Andre Chance post-WWE, he appeared in an interview with his former NXT Tag Team Championship partner Duke Hanson, formerly Duke Hudson, on Hanson’s Between Two Jobs show, where they spoke about his journey to WWE.

He revealed that WWE actually originally wanted to hire him as a coach, but after seeing him in his tryout, the company gave him the option of signing as a coach or as an active wrestler.

Despite the salary for a coach being “much higher,” he opted to sign as a wrestler.

He explained:

“Gabe (Sapolsky) calls me in July. He goes, ‘Hey, just need to let you know, we’ve sold Evolve to WWE. You weren’t under contract with us – they are going to absorb some of the contracts but you’re not one of them because you weren’t under a deal.’

“I go, ‘Okay, cool, keep me updated.’ He was like, ‘But stay ready.’ I was still working out and staying ready, but I wasn’t really expecting anything. That was July.

“In September, Gabe texts me out of the blue, he’s like, ‘Have you been staying ready?’ I was like, ‘Yeah.’ And then five minutes later I get a call from Canyon (Ceman), he’s like, ‘Hey, how have you been? Are you well? Are you in shape? Have you been working? What’s going on?’

“I was like, ‘Well, North Carolina was shut down, I’ve just been chilling, like everybody else I’ve got to work from home, and as best I can I’m staying ready.’ He was like, ‘Do you wanna come in for a tryout?’ It was the first tryout in Covid.

“Essentially, he was like, ‘You’re an interesting case, because we actually wanted to sign you as a coach, but come to the tryout anyway and then we’ll talk and discuss what we have for you. But we just really think you’d be a great coach.’

“At this time, I’m 31, I’m like, ‘Well I’m not ready to stop wrestling yet.’ They made it very clear it was one or the other. There were no player/coaches.

“At my tryout, he was like, ‘Listen, we’re calling 10 guys, it’s a small tryout, everybody’s getting signed, you’ve just gotta come to it.’ He told us that before (the tryout). This tryout was cursed… He told us, ‘Y’all are the group that we are going to sign, you’ve just gotta come to the tryout.’

“That was September – Canyon calls, he goes, ‘You’re either gonna be a coach or a wrestler, but come to the tryout as a wrestler and then we’ll talk.’

“Tryout goes really well for me… Out of the 10 that they said, ‘Y’all are definitely getting hired,’ only three of us ended up getting hired. Me, Anthony Henry and Blake Christian. For a litany of different reasons, they were like, ‘All you guys are getting signed,’ and then it just worked out to where it was only three of us.

“So I get the call in September, we do the tryout in October, I get the call back in November.

“It’s Canyon, and he’s like, ‘Hey listen, we really wanted you as a coach, but we really enjoyed your tryout too. What do you wanna do?’

“Then he gave me the numbers, and the coach was obviously a much higher salary than what the starting for a wrestler was. So I’m like, ‘Oh man, do I just take the money and just call it a day on my career?’ Again, they made it clear you can’t do both.

“It was not an easy decision. I’m thinking about it, I’m talking to my brother and he’s like, ‘Well, do you wanna be a coach or do you wanna be a wrestler?’ I’m like, ‘I wanna be a wrestler.’ He’s like, ‘Well, that’s it.’ And it was that easy of a decision. Of course, the money was appealing and attractive, but I was like, ‘I came here to be a wrestler, so I’m gonna wrestle.’

“And then I called him and told him, and even he was a bit surprised, he was like, ‘You know the pay difference, right?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, but it’s gonna be fine, it’s gonna work out.’

“I just believed. I knew. I didn’t know how it was gonna happen, but I just knew I’ve just gotta get in and then we’ll get to where we wanna go.”

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• nxt
• wwe
• Andre Chase
• Duke Hudson
• Duke Hanson
• Andre Chance

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