Andre Chance (Andre Chase) on NXT Creative Team Had No Clear Explanation For Reason For Disbanding Chase U Group and He Had Already Planned on Leaving WWE Once His Contract Expired in Early 2027

A recent episode of the Between Two Jobs podcast featured Andre Chance, former Andre Chase in WWE, as the guest. One of the topics discussed included Chance’s thoughts about the original disbanding of his Chase University group in NXT and how NXT’s officials had no clear reasons for their decision to disband the group.

“When they tell me what they’re doing, they don’t really tell me why they’re doing it. Which obviously they don’t have to. But because I think this is a conversation, I start from a business perspective, from a numbers and a dollars and cents perspective, I started to say I think this is a bad idea. At Halloween Havoc, the merch guy Teddy pulls me aside and he goes, ‘Hey, I just wanted to let you know you sold just as much merchandise as Trick and Roxanne, the champions. Now that I think about it, you did that at No Mercy, too. I think Heatwave, you had the highest selling shirt.’

So I talk about that. I talk about how we are the highest selling merch. Also, I talk about how good our ratings are, which they already have to know because they book us in five segments a show. The metrics that they say are important, I’m telling them why we have achieved these metrics. With very little advertising and very little help from them, why does it make sense that we’re selling as much merch as Trick Williams and Roxanne Perez when they’re in every main event, every piece of advertising? It shouldn’t compute and somehow we have done it.

I’m telling this to the creative team. ‘From a business perspective, can you please tell me why this is a good idea?’ And they can’t. They just say, ‘This is the direction we’re going.’ And that’s when I realized it wasn’t a conversation. They had already made up their minds and I go, ‘Okay. I can’t do anything to change your mind.’ No matter the ratings, no matter the merchandise sales, no matter the reactions, they were just ready to move on.” 

Chance also gave his thoughts about his release from WWE this past April and how he had already planned on leaving the company once his contract would have expired in the beginning of 2027.

“I feel like I manifested my release. It’s a week before WrestleMania, and it’s another WrestleMania that I’m not on. My contract was up at the beginning of next year and I was leaving anyway. I’m like, ‘What’s on the other side?’ I’ve only been in the WWE bubble for almost six years. WrestleMania weekend, Chris Hero wrestles [Senka Akatsuki]. It was unplanned, and it was awesome. The crowd, you could feel it watching it through the screen. I remember being home WrestleMania weekend and being bummed. ‘What do I want to be doing?’ I saw this clip and was like, ‘That’s what I want to be doing. I want to be in front of these crowds wrestling the way I want to and do wrestling the way I think it should be and not have anyone tell me, don’t do that. When my contract is up, I’m going to go do this.’ I’m sitting at home WrestleMania weekend. This isn’t what I dreamed of doing. I didn’t want to collect a paycheck and sit on the sidelines.”

Transcript h/t: F4WOnline.com, Fightful.com