"The line of thinking from many on the roster is that WWE aligned these cuts with the announcement of Elimination Chamber and Smackdown rights fee deal in order to minimize the negative impact on the company," said Sean Ross Sapp. He also noted that the releases were in "direct correlation" with WWE's merger with The UFC into TKO Group, which was finalized last week. https://comicbook.com/wwe/news/wwe-releases-details-why-cuts-happened/