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Bill Demott resigns from NXT Discussion Thread

119K views 883 replies 313 participants last post by  Paigeology 
#1 ·
Source: Washington Post - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...ns-of-racist-homophobic-and-abusive-behavior/
WWE trainer Bill DeMott has resigned as head coach of WWE’s Performance Center, effective immediately. DeMott made the announcement via Twitter on Friday afternoon, amid allegations from several former WWE wrestlers claiming he propagated an atmosphere of abuse and harassment that included him freely using racist and homophobic slurs.


“I deny the recent allegations made about me, however, to avoid any embarrassment or damage to the WWE, I’ve decided to step down from my role effective immediately,” the tweet reads.

“We accepted Bill DeMott’s resignation,” WWE said in a statement emailed to The Washington Post. The company chose not to comment on the ongoing allegations.

The first wrestler to go public with allegations of extreme bullying from DeMott was Austin Matelson, who worked under the ring name Judas Devlin in NXT, the WWE developmental arm DeMott led. Matelson first leveled his allegations publicly on the “Vendetta Pro Radio 2K15″ podcast earlier this week, and shortly thereafter, a letter he wrote to WWE executives complaining about DeMott in 2013 surfaced on the social media Web site Reddit.

“I am composing this memo today because I have had a number of serious concerns about the actions and words of head coach Bill Demott during my employment as talent for WWE developmental,” Matelson wrote in the letter. “Many of these actions I have tried to ignore or hope that they would cease but because they have now put me in a dangerous situation not only for my career but for my personal health and safety I feel the need to speak out to someone of a higher authority.”

The litany of allegations leveled by Matelson fall into two broad categories: 1) unnecessarily endangering wrestlers’ safety; and 2) physically and verbally wrestlers using racial and sexual slurs.

In one incident, Matelson claims he witnessed DeMott kicking a wrestler of Mexican decent in the groin and making fun of his accent. In another, Matelson says he’s heard DeMott repeatedly tell a black wrestler “to go back to Africa,” as well as criticize the sexual preferences of others.

WWE addressed those allegations after they became public earlier this week in a statement (via WhatCulture.com):

“WWE took the accusations made two years ago by Austin Matelson very seriously, conducted a full investigation and was unable to validate the claims. Regardless, WWE continues to reinforce policies and procedures to ensure a positive training environment.”

Ryan Nemeth, who wrestled for NXT under the ring name Briley Pierce and was named in Matelson’s letter as one of the victims of DeMott’s alleged abuse, disputes WWE’s claim that they conducted a “full investigation,” however. He said he was never once contacted over allegations claiming DeMott kicked him in his medical boot when he was recovering from a broken leg.


Several other wrestlers who have worked with DeMott, however, came forward with more allegations, following the lead of Matelson’s letter. Soon after “#FireBillDeMott” began to trend on Twitter with several people finding DeMott’s alleged tactics especially ironic given WWE’s association with its “B.A. STAR” alliance, which seeks to teach tolerance, encourage diversity and anti-bullying.



Speaking out was not easy but silence makes losers of us all. Stand up against injustice @WWE #BeAStar and #firebilldemott

— Judas (@JudasDraven) March 5, 2015

Shortly before DeMott announced his resignation on Friday, another damning story emerged on Reddit, which was verified by the site’s moderators. Written by a female wrestler who participated in the developmental program, the story alleges several instances of sexual harassment and the consequences of trying to report it. The woman writes:

“In developmental, Bill scared us so much that it made us ashamed and scared to speak up about anything. The few people who have come forward have alluded to some of what I want to talk about, but understand that this is a harder story to tell. … In all instances of complaining about sexual harassment…, women have been forced out of the company. After one of the talents’ dismissal, when we couldn’t figure out where she went, we were told (by DeMott), ‘If you go over my head, ask HER how well that works.’

“At any level, women who speak up for themselves are disposable.”




So apparently on twitter a lot of guys are talking about firing bill demott what do you think about this situation dicuss it in this thread.
 
#46 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

The sad part is you know there's gonna be loads of people that go, "Thats just how it is", "Who cares? Man up", and "Thats how it needs to be".

Humanity sucks if this kind of garbage gets a pass from anyone.
Ask any wrestler and they'll tell you the same. It's the same thing in sports and it's the same thing in the army. When you're building guys to work through pain 200 and 300 days a year this is the mentality they need to have, they need to be soldiers. If you don't like it then quit, nobody is forcing you to work there. Why do you think every wrestling class begins with 20 guys and ends with 4?
 
#8 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

Coach Demott told student Enzo Amore that he hopes he dies. • Demott also told our entire morning class and Ricky Steamboat's class to kill themselves just days after we tolled the ring bell 10 times for the late Mike Graham a former star FCW wrestler, who committed suicide.

• Coach Demott routinely bullies Enzo verbally as well as physically. I have seen Enzo on several occasions be slapped in the face by Bill. During one practice he decided to show Enzo how doing a slam wrong could hurt someone, so he picked Enzo up and dropped him without warning directly on his head and neck. He then decided that each time a student slammed his 100lbs heavy bag with bad form that student had to slam one of his peers the same way. Demott found this drill amusing yet each student was put at serious injury risk.


Why demott be bullying my man Enzo though? This shit is terrible to read.
 
#620 ·
re: Bill Demott resigns from NXT Discussion Thread - NO OTHER THREADS

Think about this-

DeMott did all this shit and WWE protected him, yet Del Rio got fired after leveling a dude for being racist.
Yeah, it's fucked up. WWE portray themselves as this totally PC, worker-friendly business, but in reality the company is all about politics, PR, and money.
 
#184 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

Jericho is a full on WWE cocksucker these days, check out his latest tweet:

Chris Jericho ‏@IAmJericho 48s49 seconds ago
Hey @BillDeMott is a good friend & great trainer. If u can’t handle it then quit. My training at #HartBrothers camp was 10,000 times worse!
:lmao

I guess the Harts made him train naked. :jay

Get lost. Go sing some of your shit music. (And I'm a longtime Jericho fan)
 
#200 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

Jericho is a full on WWE cocksucker these days, check out his latest tweet:



:lmao

I guess the Harts made him train naked. :jay

Get lost. Go sing some of your shit music. (And I'm a longtime Jericho fan)
What a POS he's become. Like he grabs a cape with a WWE logo on it and whooshes straight to his computer when somebody dares talk bad about the WWE or a WWE employee. :lol
 
#105 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

After playing half a hour of Career mode, i felt like starting that hashtag myself ;) :p
 
#119 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

After playing half a hour of Career mode, i felt like starting that hashtag myself ;) :p
Ya know? LOL

I'm over here playing on my PS4 the other day and he's constantly heckling me in the performance center. And that's the video game version with scripted lines lmfao. I'm sure DeMott Unplugged would make me want to punch him in the face.
 
#432 ·
Re: Another Bill DeMott Bullying Story Emerges

People are too soft these days. It's fucking pro wrestling, not ballet. I remember Vader recalling fondly having his wrestling trainer shove him into a port-a-potty and dunking his head in the bowl. Guys tell stories of Stu Hart stretching them to the point that they cried. This stuff is how they weed out the guys that aren't tough enough to be there. You deal with the hazing and earn everyone's respect. That's all there is to it.

JK, I wanted to know what it felt like to be Chris Jericho. Fuck Bill Demott
 
#310 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

Innocent until proven guilty is for the court of law not the court of public opinion. You base your opinion on what you have read so far. You, yourself, say you refuse to read what has been reported and yet you condemn those that have read it and have made an opinion about it.

There's nothing wrong with having an opinion on the matter.
 
#313 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

Innocent until proven guilty is for the court of law not the court of public opinion. You base your opinion on what you have read so far. You, yourself, say you refuse to read what has been reported and yet you condemn those that have read it and have made an opinion about it.

There's nothing wrong with having an opinion on the matter.
:fact
 
#333 ·
Re: #FireBillDemott

Most of the important news bits from this thread are all listed here in this piece Dave Meltzer just wrote for the latest Observer Newsletter. Not much news in here but it does list most of the highlights and some additional info.

Because of an interview with Austin Matelson and his releasing a copy of a memo he sent to WWE management in 2013, the subject of Bill DeMott’s training methods in Florida became a major topic of discussion again this past week.

Matelson, who wrestled in developmental as Judas Devlin, and now lives in Woodland Hills, CA, released a copy of a letter he sent about DeMott to Canyon Ceman, Dorothy Brill and Jane Geddes, who worked in Human Resources and Talent Relations in WWE at the time.

DeMott has been an interesting figure in the company. He was far more organized and structured than prior head coaches, but his demeanor is often the drill Sergeant type. Obviously that is the role they want out of the head coach, because his demeanor was already known in a previous tenure with the company, when John Laurinaitis released him from the position with Deep South Wrestling after numerous complaints.

In that period, WWE had two developmental programs, the Deep South promotion in Georgia with DeMott as head coach and run by former wrestler Jody Hamilton (best known as The Assassin); and Ohio Valley Wrestling out of Louisville, with a variety of head coaches over the years, including Al Snow at the end (Tom Prichard was another coach), headed by Danny Davis. It was almost unanimous that the wrestlers liked OVW more than Deep South. Those who did both felt they learned more wrestling in OVW, and Deep South was more beating you down physically and less learning in the ring.

When Paul Levesque took over developmental, he installed DeMott as head coach, a position formerly held by Prichard, and established his own team. Bringing DeMott back was a surprise, but stemmed from DeMott being used as the head trainer on the last season of Tough Enough.

The stories involved were two years old, and there was a lot of unrest among talent in Florida at the time, because the injury rate was so high. A lot of changes were made due to that.

Keys from the Matelson letter:

*He asked it to be kept in confidence, fearing reprisals from DeMott, saying DeMott had already said that people complaining to Human Resources was a “F****t” way of dealing with problems.

*On February 28, 2013, Matelson was working a house show after suffering a knee injury in a drill and was diagnosed with a partially torn PCL and a second strained ligament. The injury came after three hours of training, 60 bumps and was to give ten fireman carry’s to a 280 pound wrestler named Gary Jackson, who collapsed from exhaustion on his back, driving his knees to the mat. After the second injury to the knee, he claimed DeMott told him the injury can’t keep flaring up, that it doesn’t look good for his career going forward. He said he took that to mean he had to cover up injuries or he could be punished or fired. He said other talent feel the same way about hiding injuries, because DeMott would tell injured wrestlers that the injuries were a sign of their weakness as men.

*He also gave accounts of what he called dangerous workout drills, noting injuries from them.

*He claimed DeMott, on a daily basis, would make unprofessional choices in words and actions that go against company policies. He said that has created a culture of fear and negativity in the system, and that just showing up for training daily is mentally agonizing. He said DeMott routinely makes fun of anyone sitting out practice and created a hostile work environment.

*He called Oliver Grey (since cut after a major knee injury) “Joel Pedophile.” Grey’s real name is Joel Pettyfer.

*When Dante Dash used a running powerslam as his finisher, and called it the Davey Boy, after Davey Boy Smith, DeMott said, “The Davey Boy? That’s turning blue and dropping dead on the lawn.” I do remember that story because it created a lot of disgust at the time among certain wrestlers because Harry Smith was in FCW for a long time and was friends with a lot of people there, as was T.J. Wilson (who was considered almost like part of the Hart family growing up, so insulting Smith would be like insulting a close relative, even before marrying into the family). It also was a generational thing because to the wrestlers of DeMott’s generation, Smith was known for one thing. To the younger wrestlers, many of whom grew up holding reverence to the stars they grew up with, hearing a wrestler talk about a wrestler of their childhood that way, came across very differently. Also the manner it was said rubbed people the wrong way. Over the past two years more than one person has told me that story in detail and those telling it were all upset by it.

*DeMott told Enzo Amore that he hopes he dies, and told other students to kill themselves just days after Mike Graham’s suicide.

*Said DeMott would bully Amore, verbally and physically, including slapping him in the face several times. He claimed that in teaching how not to do a slam, he picked Amore up and dropped him on his head and neck. Others noted DeMott slapping Amore was something corroborated by others and said not to be isolated, although at this point, the feeling is Amore will have to stick up for DeMott since he has a shot at the main roster.

*Said DeMott kicked Memo Montenegro (Guillermo Rodriguez, younger brother of Alberto El Patron) in the groin and laughed when he crumpled to the ground.

*Constantly made fun of how Montenegro talked English.

*Said DeMott called Gary Jackson a fat tub of goo, told Osmund Cherry to go back to Africa and called Brandon Taven “half a sissy” to make fun of him due to injuries. Once he claimed that when Taven complained about a head injury from a blow in practice had left him dizzy, that DeMott then slapped Taven in the head.

*He claimed he saw that when Rusev was recovering from neck surgery, DeMott saw him wearing a New York Jets shirt in practice, and grabbed him by the collar and tried to rip the shirt off. Rusev had not been cleared for any contact and was in a lot of pain after the incident.

*He claimed that when Briley Pierce (the younger brother of Dolph Ziggler) had a broken leg, DeMott kicked him in his walking boot. Matelson noted that story came from before he was under contract, but that others who saw it talked about it. Pierce has since confirmed the story.

*He said Oliver Grey was told if he missed any practice due to a back injury, DeMott would pull him from the next set of tapings and keep him from attending the Royal Rumble.

*Matelson made it clear to praise the training of people like Lance Storm (who came to Florida as a guest trainer), Ricky Steamboat, Terry Taylor and Billy Gunn.

This is a difficult subject because from the WWE standpoint, a huge part of the business is the ability to work hurt without complaining about it. In theory, that doesn’t mean work with serious injuries, but everyone is banged up with injuries all the time. If you can’t work with minor injuries, you won’t survive on the roster and there are things done whether it be working people to death, or theoretically weeding out complainers, that are an inherent part of the training process. Plus, just the fact they hired DeMott for the spot meant that was the type of person Paul Levesque wants there. But there is a line. I know of people with a lot of experience in the business who went through there who have complained to me about similar things in this letter, but they were also balanced and defended DeMott against other allegations saying they were overblown or not as bad as they seemed.

The WWE released a statement regarding the memo being released saying, “WWE took the accusations made two years ago by Austin Matelson very seriously, conducted a full investigation and was unable to validate the claims. Regardless, WWE continues to reinforce policies and procedures to ensure a positive training environment.”

However, even before this story this week we had heard a lot of rumblings regarding DeMott once again, more in the sense these things continue to resurface and it could wind up a problem.

This situation took place in early 2013 when the letter that Matelson asked be kept confidential started getting around. At first there was talk that Canyon Ceman in Talent Relations was taking it very seriously, but it was not addressed until after that year’s WrestleMania rather than immediately. At the time, the company’s investigation stated that the allegations were untrue based on the fact the allegations were coming from “bottom five” talent (people on the verge of being cut). When this got out, it was news to the talent involved, who, with the exception of Rusev and Amore, neither of whom publicly said anything to management about the stories involving them that is known, have all been cut. They didn’t even realize they were “bottom five” and in danger until that slipped out from management.

Ryan Nemeth (Briley Pierce) went on Twitter as a response saying how in two years he was never questioned about any of the allegations, and questioned how could it be a full investigation given one of the incidents claimed involved him and he was never contacted about it.

Others around at the time said there were talents questioned, and questioned it, noting some were asked by DeMott himself, but claimed the investigation did not appear to be thorough, given many people around at the time were never talked with. One person who was directly involved in most of these situations as a witness said he was never questioned by anyone.

A few who were around have noted to us that there is accuracy to most stories, although there were some exaggerations in some cases. Also, because everything now is taped (for legal defense reasons) and with the move to the Performance Center things have changed, but the claim is that things like this did happen in the past.

A second letter was sent out with similar allegations by Ryan Collins, who wrestled as Eric Draven, on March 25, 2013, shortly after the letter by Matelson, with a lot of similar claims.

Collins said that he wrote that he was writing the letter after being encouraged to do so by his original trainer, Harley Race. The letter said that Race would like people from the office to call him if they have any questions about the situation.

Collins said he suffered a minor head injury, felt dizzy and stepped out of the ring. He said he went to practice the next day and was going to play it by ear how he felt, but after some rolls, felt dizzy and went to the trainer. He was being attended to when he claimed DeMott asked him what happened, told him the story and DeMott accused him of making things worse.

“The main part of this story that angers me is that as he was leaving the trainers room, Coach DeMott slapped me on the head. This really angered me as I don’t believe he has the right to put his hands on anyone, especially like that. I was lucky that my head injury wasn’t too serious. His negligence in this situation could have worsened by injury.”

The letter also claimed he was tired of DeMott bullying him, hitting him, calling him and others gay, “half a sissy,” and “f*****s.” Collins said on several occasions, DeMott grabbed the bottom rope while people were watching practice, pulled it back to hit everyone in the face. He also claimed after talking to Race that they do several countless unproductive to straight up dangerous drills, and said Race was very angry about what he told him and said he couldn’t understand why things like that were being done. Collins said he trained five years with Race and it was nothing like that.

Collins made similar claims that Matelson did, saying DeMott called Pettyfer “Pedophile,”(which, while in poor taste, was just him making fun of the guy’s real name, similar to some of the nicknames he gave talent on Tough Enough like Skidmarks), smacked Eric Arndt (Amore) in the mouth and told Arndt to kill himself on at least one occasion. Collins also praised the training he got from Steve Keirn, Steamboat, Taylor and Gunn.

Collins was released seven weeks later.

Chris Jericho defended DeMott on Twitter, saying, “Hey, Bill DeMott is a good friend and great trainer. If you can’t handle it, then quit. My training at Hart Brothers camp was 10,000 times worse.”

Michael Hutter, better known as Ethan Carter III in TNA, who was in developmental for several years, responded by writing, “I loved and sacrificed for pro wrestling. A Hart can stretch me any day. A know-nothing dipshit slapping me when I’m concussed is different.”
 
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