Eli Drake Discusses His Departure From Impact Wrestling

– Eli Drake was a guest on a recent edition of Wrestling Inc’s WINCLY podcast. Highlights from the interview are below.

On Leaving Impact: “It was a decision I made earlier this year and I talked to them about the idea that I was probably gonna move on. Credit to Ed Nordholm as we hashed everything out and figured out how I could move on without a 12-month non-compete. As of Monday or Tuesday of this week, I am officially good to move on. My contract was up. They didn’t know if I was leaving and I didn’t know if I was leaving. So of course, you’re gonna be written a particular way if it’s believed that you’re gonna be leaving.”

On Turning Down The United We Stand Match Against Tessa Blanchard: “I don’t regret it. I don’t apologize. I don’t feel any of that. I feel a particular way about the wrestling business, and there’s a lot of parody or play wrestling, if you will. Comedy and silliness has a place in wrestling, but there’s still gotta be some level of believability. It was not a knock against anyone other than me just trying to protect my own brand. I got a lot of text messages from guys saying, ‘Thank you for not taking that.’ But to me it wasn’t a political stance, but a lot of people took it that way. I don’t think most of the people in the locker room care. Some people saw my side of it and some saw the side of why I should do it. But no one in the locker room was that vocal about anything.”