Cedric Alexander ‘100 percent’ hoping to reunite with Hurt Syndicate in AEW

With free agency approaching, Cedric Alexander is hoping to reunite with The Hurt Syndicate in AEW.

Alexander was released from his WWE contract on February 7 and will be free to elsewhere in May once his 90 day non-compete is up. He appeared on a new episode of Insight with Chris Van Vliet that was released on Thursday, opening up about his release.

“Good,” Alexander responded when asked how he’s doing. “Everything’s fine. Once I got that news, I wasn’t even mad. It kind of felt like a pressure was lifted off my shoulders. Oh wow, I’m free to do other things, cool, all right, let’s see what happens.”

Though he wasn’t expecting to be released, Alexander was not surprised by the news. He always thought he was going to be let go when WWE made other roster cuts in the past. Surviving those cuts made him think he had a real future in the company, but things kind of fizzled out.

“I wasn’t expecting it, but it was the thing of, like, I wasn’t surprised,” he said. “I guess I kind of saw the writing on the wall after a while. It was kind of just, eh.”

Alexander’s mindset is that WWE was his job, but wrestling is his career. He still gets to be a wrestler despite his dream job with WWE being over.

“So I immediately thought to myself when I was released, I was like, ‘Ok, that’s a job. Wrestling is my career. I may be out of a job, but I still have a career.’ All thanks to [Mustafa] Ali, he’s one of the guys that — he called me within the hour of me being released and was immediately like, ‘Hey dude, it’s all good.’ You know, just being super positive, as Ali is,” Alexander said. “It sucked, because it’s a dream job. It’s one of those jobs that I’m a kid and I’m like, ‘Oh my god, I’m going to wrestle for WWE.’ Then when it ends, it just ends. You just move on.”

In addition to Ali, Shelton Benjamin and Lince Dorado have also been a big help to Alexander after his release. Alexander said he’s even heard from some people that he didn’t think he had a good rapport with. He and Dakota Kai only had a few conversations in the locker room, but she reached out wishing him well.

Going back to the indies feels like starting over for Alexander after spending nine years with WWE. He needed to catch up on which promotions are good to work for and find out which opponents are hot right now. Alexander has three months of bookings lined up and knows he’ll be able to make money in wrestling, but his biggest concern is making sure that he can still provide the quality of life that his wife and daughter deserve.

Alexander said AEW is where he wants to end up, but it’s fine if that doesn’t happen. He listed NJPW and Mexico as other places he would like to go.

“100 percent,” he responded when Van Vliet asked if he wants to join The Hurt Syndicate in AEW. “That’s a big chapter of my career that I really felt was never fully explored. And I think it’ll be great to finish that out.”

Bobby Lashley, Benjamin, MVP, and Alexander were known as The Hurt Business in WWE. The other three members of the group besides Alexander are all signed to AEW now, with Lashley & Benjamin currently holding the AEW Tag Team titles.

Van Vliet’s full interview with Alexander can be watched below: