Chris Harris: WWE Wanted To Erase People’s TNA Past When I Came In As Braden Walker

‘Wildcat’ Chris Harris recently spoke with Chris Van Vliet on his Insight podcast about his name change in WWE and feeling like he never quite got the opportunity that he deserved. 

While not being extremely active in the professional wrestling scene anymore, Chris Harris had performed at the IMPACT Against All Odds event at the beginning of July in a 10-man tag team match, where he was victorious alongside James Storm, Heath, and The Good Brothers against Honor No More. 

During his interview with Chris Van Vliet, Chris Harris talked about WWE changing his name from Chris Harris to Braden Walker.

“It was unfortunate that they would do that but I can’t say that I was surprised. Going in there, they just want to erase your past, which is unfortunate because you try so hard to build up a reputation for yourself and not that they would ever talk about TNA, but they don’t want them to talk about you like you are a rookie. Going in there, I tried to keep a positive attitude. The Wildcat is gone, I’m going to be a whole new character. They gave me the name, and a lot of people have trashed that for years, but it wasn’t a surprise. They gave me the name, if I was still able to be myself, I could take any name that they throw at me. I could make Braden Walker work if they had given me an opportunity. There was no preparation and no thought behind it. I think I was doomed from the start.” 

Chris Harris had announced his WWE signing in late January of 2008. He spoke with Chris Van Vliet about how he feels that he was just never given the opportunity while in the WWE. 

“I was there for close to a year, and I just from the get-go, I just saw different things. When I first went, people were excited to see me and they didn’t want news getting out, it felt like a big deal. ‘We’ve got plans for you.’ Things like that. I felt like maybe I made the right decision. But within weeks, I was seeing that there was no background to this and no thought and I was just going to be one of the ones that are just thrown out there, and I was. I was just thrown out there, there was no story or background to Braden Walker or anything like that. I had generic music, gear, name, there was no reason for people to get behind me. I still feel like I could have made that work if they let me wrestle, but they were even taking that away from me. Seconds and minutes before I went out, I had a producer change my match. ‘You can’t do this and you can’t do that, so why don’t you try..’ You’re messing with me man, I couldn’t go out and be myself in the ring. It was very unfortunate and I felt like I could make it work, but the opportunity was never presented to me.” 

Harris wrestled for just a short period of time under the WWE Braden Walker name, beginning his career there in March of 2008 in a dark match against Shelton Benjamin. Only to be waiting until July to have his next match there, this time under the ECW brand, where he was victorious in his two matches against Armando Estrada and James Curtis before being released by the WWE in August of 2008. 

Thanks to Chris Van Vliet for sending the above quotes. You can check out the full interview at this link.