Unfortunately, the WWE releases continue.
This time, it’s Ridge Holland, who confirmed on his social media that WWE informed him that they would not renew his contract on November 14th.
I’ve been informed that WWE will not be renewing my contract when it ends on November 14th. WWE are still going to cover my rehab from injury but my guaranteed pay will end, quite frustrating to say the least as I cannot work for another 6 months due to the aforementioned injury, with a family of 5 to support.
My career with WWE has been blighted by misfortune but I’m still thankful and grateful for the opportunity and experience. The shining light that has always kept me going is the HUGE support from a handful of special human beings. Thank you.
I’m unsure what lies ahead of me in terms of wrestling but going forward I will be working hard to heal up and in that time I will be launching my own online coaching business so stay tuned.
Cheers
It’s a shame that Holland’s contract is not being renewed under these circumstances. WWE has been cleaning house as of late and they've pulled no punches on releasing or not renewing talent lately. Kylie Rae is out for being pregnant and WWE opted to not renew her deal. Nevertheless, this brings Holland’s seven year tenure with WWE to a close.
Holland had a tryout in 2016, but he wasn’t signed until 2018. The 37-year-old was in the middle of a push in 2020, but he suffered an ankle dislocation and fracture in his left leg and a knee patellar dislocation and patellar tendon rupture in his right leg. He came back nine months to finish off his feuds in NXT and Holland was called up to the main roster in 2021.
Holland, Sheamus, and Pete Dunne (who was renamed to Butch) made their debut as The Brawling brutes. The trio was mainly in the mid card, with their most notable feud being against The New Day. During a tag team match in March 2022, Holland delivered an overhead belly-to-belly suplex that saw former WWE Champion Big E land on his neck. That was an accident, but it did mark the end of Big E’s in-ring career. Holland continued to take part of the Brawling Brutes until 2023 when the group finally disbanded following weeks of tension.
Holland was brought back down to NXT and he came in challenging the then NXT Champion, but ended up losing against Ilja Dragunov. Holland floated in the upper and mid card, with him actually winning the NXT Tag Team titles with Andre Chase back in 2024, but that run only lasted 19 days. Holland was mostly used in live events for the past year, though he did have some notable television matches. He recently returned to television for TNA by attacking Mike Santana. They had a match at Victory Road, which the new TNA World Champion won in about eight minutes. Holland suffered a serious Lisfranc injury against Moose during a television taping. There’s no reports on whether there were plans for Holland before the latest injury.