Mustafa Ali recalls losing his first name in WWE.
In March 2019, Mustafa Ali was no more in WWE, as his name was shortened to Ali. This move was met with fan backlash, as Ali was just another wrestler that had his name cut in half by WWE.
The change ended up being short lived, as Ali would regain his first name later that year. In a new interview with Chris Van Vliet, Ali blamed the name change on dueling chants that he received at various live events.
“When you do live events, these producers, they write reports. This is during the babyface run, I think I’m working with Shinsuke Nakamura or something like that. One portion of the crowd is chanting, ‘Mustafa’ and the other portion of the crowd is chanting, ‘Ali’. It’s just a weird chant and it just died out. It happened a few nights so that got written in the report. So whoever makes the decisions, I’m assuming it was Vince at the time, just said let’s call him Ali.”
Ali then recalled the conversation with Road Dogg, saying that he told him that he didn't really have a say in the matter.
“That’s how I lost my name. I think Road Dogg called and he was like, ‘Hey, I just wanna double check, Mustafa, it’s not like a family — does it mean something to you?’ I go, well, the name means like the chosen one. It means from the people, like this is the guy that’s going to represent. So it means something to me, sure, but I don’t want to lie to you. ‘Okay cool man, we’re gonna just call you Ali now, this is what happened, this is the feedback we got. I don’t think there are any ill intentions, they want you to win, they want you to make money, you know? We just think it’s easier.' Okay yeah, rock and roll. I go, ‘Well, do I have a say in this?’ He goes, ‘Well, no not really.’ [laughs]"
Elsewhere in the interview, Ali recalled filming an assassination attempt angle in TNA with Mike Bailey. Learn more about the details and timeframe of the segment by clicking here.
Ali is currently a free agent in the world of wrestling, as he departed from TNA Wrestling after Slammiversary in July.
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