Paul Heyman referenced Samoa Joe’s exit from WWE on the latest episode of SmackDown post-show Talking Smack.
Joe was released by WWE in April 2021 after six years with the company. The former NXT Champion mostly worked as an announcer on RAW during his last 17 months in WWE. Two other members of WWE’s broadcast team, Charly Caruso and Renee Young, have also departed in the last year.
On this week’s Talking Smack, host Kayla Braxton said the phrase “cup of Joe” after watching a video of Shinsuke Nakamura drinking coffee. Heyman jokingly told her not to mention the names of people who no longer work for WWE.
"Joe… we don’t talk about people that don’t work here anymore, former announcers, so let’s please leave Joe out of the equation, okay?" Heyman said. "We don’t talk about Joe, we don’t talk about Renee, we don’t talk about Charly, and one day we won’t be talking about you."
Kayla Braxton smiled and threw her arms in the air after Paul Heyman’s comment. The former ECW owner then continued his conversation with Shinsuke Nakamura, who spoke in Japanese for the entire segment.
Samoa Joe’s WWE accomplishments
Samoa Joe held the NXT Championship twice and United States Championship twice during his time in WWE. However, he was unable to win a World Championship on either RAW or SmackDown.
In 2017, Joe unsuccessfully challenged for Brock Lesnar’s Universal Championship at Great Balls of Fire and SummerSlam. He also failed to win the WWE Championship during his rivalries with AJ Styles in 2018 and Kofi Kingston in 2019.
Paul Heyman has been known to casually mention WWE releases on Talking Smack in the past. Following Charly Caruso's exit, he joked to Kayla Braxton that WWE "got rid of the wrong female journalist around here."