Impact has officially parted ways with a former World Champion.
The company issued a statement on Sunday confirming that they have “terminated” the contract of Eli Drake (Shaun Ricker) effective today.
Impact Wrestling announced today that it has terminated its relationship with Shaun Ricker, known as ‘Eli Drake’.
Drake first signed with Impact back in 2015, as the company made the transition to the Impact Wrestling name, along with a brief merger with Jeff Jarrett’s former Global Force Wrestling. In 2016, Drake became the GFW World Heavyweight Champion and later held the Impact Tag Team Championships with Scott Steiner in 2018.
He was scheduled to take part at Thursday’s United We Stand iPPV event in New Jersey, but didn’t end up wrestling against Tessa Blanchard in an intergender match. Drake seemed to indicate he didn’t want to take part in those kinds of matches. Joey Ryan ended up replacing Drake on the card this past Thursday.
https://twitter.com/TheEliDrake/status/1099044040924753920
Drake signed a developmental deal with WWE back in 2013 and was briefly part of the company’s NXT brand before being released in August of 2014.
Thanks to our friends at Online World of Wrestling for help with this report.