Matthew Lyda Breaks Silence on Being Replaced by Michelle McCool on Undertaker’s Podcast

Matthew Lyda is finally speaking out after being quietly removed from The Undertaker’s Six Feet Under podcast — and he’s taking it all in stride, even if it felt like a breakup.

Originally launched as an independent project between Lyda and The Undertaker before WWE got involved, Six Feet Under went dark in March 2025. When it returned in June, it was under the WWE & Fanatics podcast network — and Lyda was nowhere to be found. In his place? The Deadman’s wife, Michelle McCool. Now, Lyda has shared what went down behind the scenes during a video interview with former WWE star Maven. He recalled the exact moment the news hit him — right after wrapping a recording session.

“He goes, ‘Ahh, I really want to talk to you about some stuff.’ I thought that he was about to tell me, ‘I’m done.’ I thought he was just going to be like, ‘Hey man, [WWE] LFG, everything else. I’m done. You know, too much on my plate.’ He was like, ‘Hey, you know, the podcast is going to be taken over by WWE. We’re moving in that direction.’”

Lyda knew what that meant without it needing to be said.

“And I looked at him, I was like, ‘So I’m assuming that this is the end of my run on this?’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, unfortunately.’”

Lyda admitted the exchange made him feel like he’d just been dumped or fired. But he emphasized that their friendship remains rock solid and even credited The Undertaker for keeping him on longer than he probably should have. Their parting words, he says, made that loyalty clear.

“He and I talked for a little bit more. I go outside with him, he’s at his truck, he just looked at me and goes, ‘We good?’ I said, ‘Mark, we said something a long time ago, we were at a hotel [in Savannah, Georgia], and we shook hands and we said — if money ever comes in between us, we’re going to shut the whole thing down, we’re going to go to the woods, and we’re going to go hunting. And we’ll forget about all of it.’”

Despite being replaced, Lyda said he’s proud of what they built together and hopes the original spirit of the show isn’t lost now that WWE is running things.

“I helped create a channel and I helped create a podcast that has the WWE logo on it now. That’s pretty damn cool, in my opinion.”

Lyda, an executive with Nine Line Apparel — a patriotic clothing brand — met Undertaker after the WWE legend was spotted wearing a Nine Line shirt. The friendship eventually led to the launch of Six Feet Under, but it’s now evolved into something much bigger.