Released WWE Star Recalls Paul Heyman Standing Up For Him

WWE

Former WWE star AJ Francis (Top Dolla) has recalled WWE Hall of Fame inductee Paul Heyman standing up for him while he was with the company.

During his runs with WWE, Francis wrestled as part of the Hit Row faction.

Speaking on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, Francis noted that Heyman would hype up his music, arguing that it was different to songs made by other kayfabe musician wrestlers.

Discussing his relationship with Paul Heyman, Francis said:

“The one good thing is that Paul Heyman used to stand up for me a lot and Paul Heyman would say, ‘They can’t see the difference between what, like, John Cena and Max Caster and what you’re doing.’ He said, ‘Theirs is like, not comedy, but, kayfabe rap. It’s rap within the wrestling realm. Yours is like actual, livable, breathable hip-hop’ and he said, ‘Because of that, it makes it more real. So if you’re not into that, you can’t understand it.’

“So did they want me to not do it? No, they had no problem with me doing it. They just wasn’t gonna put ‘em on TV. There’s so many times Paul Heyman would text me, ‘Man, this should be how we start the show tonight.’ I would send him my video I’m doing, I sent him one I did for the Christmas show.

“He was like, ‘This should start the show tonight…’ Sent him so many different ones that we did and mind you, I never get my flowers, Hit Row never gets our flowers. When L.A. Knight had that 2 million-view video on YouTube in 24 hours, from the Madison Square Garden dark show, we were in the segment with him. No one ever gave us our flowers for that. I don’t know how many times that happened on WWE.

“Not just with L.A. Knight but just on WWE YouTube since, but we never got flowers for that. The only match that was promoted for the Christmas show — which is one of the highest-watched shows in SmackDown history and I think the highest-watched pre-taped show in WWE history — the only promoted match for that was Usos versus Hit Row, for the Tag Team Titles.

“We never got our flowers for that. But Paul Heyman would always show me love and like, I would send him my videos and he would love them, and I would send other people my videos and they would love them.

“But they just would never put them on TV and then sometimes, I would make videos, we would make videos, Hit Row, and we would send it to the creative team and they would be like, ‘This is great! We’re gonna try to put this on the show!’ And then something would happen. Don’t know who, don’t know why, but it just wouldn’t be a part of the show.”

Francis was released by WWE in September 2023.

Heyman will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame during this year’s ceremony ahead of WrestleMania 40.

For the latest updates on the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2024 click here.

Transcription via POST Wrestling. 

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• Top Dolla
• AJ Francis
• paul heyman
• wwe

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