Apparently, the Authors of Pain were considering leaving WWE.
When the former WWE stars were down in NXT, the Authors of Pain rose to the point where they were considered one of the best tag teams in the entire company. Though Akam and Rezar didn’t have much experience coming into the WWE, the two heavyweights learned pretty quick and a big part of that was due to Paul Ellering.
Ellering was an essential guide within the AOP act, so it was quite baffling when Vince decided to break up AOP and Paul Ellering for no good reason. It was speculated that the WWE Hall of Famer didn’t want to take part of the long travels, but Ellering has disputed that claim.
Ultimately, the decision came down to Vince McMahon and he simply didn’t want Ellering with the duo. This was also a time where Vince wasn’t particularly keen on managers outside of Paul Heyman.
That decision immediately had an impact on Akam and Rezar’s career. Ellering was a valuable commodity within the AOP group and the former NXT Tag Team Champion came extremely close to handing in their resume.
“That was the day that we were deciding to stop with WWE,” Rezar told Alistair McGeorge of Metro. “We were just called up, and the first day at the main roster, they were telling us, ‘You have to leave Paul Ellering. Me and my tag team partner Akam, Sonny, he said, ‘Yo, let’s just give our resignation letter and just leave,’ but Paul told us, ‘Try it out. I’ve helped you guys to get there, so much hard work, we can always get the back back together later.'”
Rezar believes that Vince simply didn’t want anyone older than him to be on his show.
“He didn’t like older people than him or people his age on the show. He wanted to be the only elderly person who would be in the spotlight at the time,” he said.
It is true that their careers were never the same when Ellering was forced to be removed, but there were several other contributions including the way the duo was booked (especially during their second run) and The Authors of Pain were injury prone. The former WWE star was given a big opportunity to work alongside Seth Rollins in 2019, but Rezar suffered a bicep injury that derailed WWE plans. The duo was eventually released the first time in September 2020.
Ellering did do a recent interview with HANNIBAL TV where he stated that AOP was still interested in working in pro wrestling, though Rezar never confirms (or denies) that statement.