Kevin Kelly joined WWE in 1996 and filled many roles through his time in the promotion including host, announcer, and interviewer.
Kelly ended up being with the promotion until 2003, but he was originally going to be fired in 2001. However, Kelly remained employed because he simply refused.
"I was in the process of buying a house. The closing was in a couple of weeks away. You can't fire me," Kelly explained on the Insiders Edge podcast when asked about telling Jim Ross "no" when Ross was asked to fire him. "I've already told my landlord that I'm moving. I'm buying a house. 'Do you even know what I do, JR? Do you even know how many hats I wear? Who is going to do all the jobs that I do if you're letting me go? We need to talk about this because it's not going to work for me.' He said, 'Okay.' I was going to get fired, what's the worst that could happen? He was going to shoot me with a gun? I didn't call him an asshole or MFer, I just said, 'Hey, no.'"
Kelly ended up making it a couple more years with WWE, and when he was eventually fired, he asked for extra months severance.
"Then, when they finally did fire me, I knew it was coming, but I was the last one to get cut. It was 03 and they were going department by department. You hear about it, people getting let go. I knew it was coming. I was in the last round. Everyone was very nice. They said, 'You were here almost seven full years. We will treat that as eight years and give you four months of severance.' I said, 'I did a lot of work while I was here. I had two or three jobs at a time, I would like six months severance please. I feel I deserve it.' The lady said, 'Okay.' Again, why not ask? What's the worst that will happen? I didn't ask for anything ridiculous. I asked for a couple extra months of severance," Kelly recalled before saying that the extra months severance helped as he was out of a job for 11 months and he had bills to pay.
Kelly is now the voice of New Japan Pro-Wrestling in America as the lead play-by-play English announcer for the promotion.
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