Ilja Dragunov disappeared from WWE television after WrestleMania and never came back. Now we know why that return may never have happened at all.
According to PWInsider on August 20, Dragunov is exiting WWE after his contract expired, ending months of questions surrounding one of the strangest absences on the roster.
“Ilja Dragonuv is exiting World Wrestling Entertainment, PWInsider.com can exclusively confirm. We are told that Dragonuv’s deal has expired.”
That’s quite the turn considering Dragunov was never announced as injured, released or otherwise unavailable. He simply wrestled during WrestleMania weekend and then vanished. PWInsider confirmed that was his final WWE appearance.
“He last performed Wrestlemania weekend.”
The timing also makes some recent comments about Dragunov look considerably more interesting. Just before news of his exit broke, WrestleVotes was asked why WWE hadn’t been using him. JoeyVotes admitted Dragunov’s name wasn’t exactly coming up much behind the scenes.
“I haven’t heard his name in weeks.”
TC pointed toward WWE’s increasing reliance on analytics and what he described as the company’s new “Moneyball” approach. According to him, WWE looks closely at things like audience behavior, searches and other numbers when determining who gets television time.
“Analytics, man. They rely on analytics so much. And if these numbers look bad against you and not in your favor, they won’t use you as much. Some of these guys are feeling the effects of WWE’s new Moneyball approach, where they take numbers, analytics, and reporting.”
When it came specifically to Dragunov, JoeyVotes didn’t dance around where he apparently stood.
“His merch is nothing. He’s had one or two shirts, so there’s no, ‘Man, I really like this guy. I’ll buy his T-shirt.’ He’s not a priority. We can say that.”
Dragunov certainly wasn’t sitting at home unable to wrestle either. He had been publicly training at the Hart Dungeon during his absence, while earlier reports indicated there hadn’t been much creative discussion surrounding him.
Now that entire stretch has a pretty definitive ending. Dragunov wrestled during WrestleMania weekend, disappeared from television, spent months without an obvious creative direction and was recently described as not being a WWE priority. Instead of eventually popping back up on Raw or SmackDown, his contract has now reportedly expired and he’s heading out.
For months, the question was when WWE would finally bring Ilja Dragunov back. Suddenly, it’s where he shows up next.
Where do you think Ilja Dragunov should go after his reported WWE exit? Let us know in the comments.
