Samoa Joe Might Be Injured
It's possible that former two time NXT Champion Samoa Joe may be injured. He appeared at Thursday's WWE NXT live event in Riverside, California, before the main event and announced that he had not been cleared to compete. He then stuck around ringside and witnessed NXT Champion Shinsuke Nakamura and Tye Dillinger defeat Bobby Roode and Andrade "Cien" Almas.
Joe worked the NXT Championship Steel Cage Match against Nakamura in Melbourne, Australia on December 8th, losing what appeared to be his final one on one contest with his arch-rival.
Joe then worked the Newcastle event on December 10th, with a main event was a six-man tag of Nakamura, Dillinger and Buddy Murphy defeating Joe, Roode and Elias Samson. People in attendance reported that Joe and Nakamura barely got involved in the action. Joe then worked the Gold Coast Live Event on December 12th, which saw Nakamura and TM-61 defeat Joe and The Revival. Again, according to reports, there wasn't a lot of Joe in that match either.
Joe's last match took place on December 13th in Sydney, teaming with with Roode and Samson in a loss to Nakamura, Murphy and Dillinger. Audience members were said to be dissatisfied with the stalling and lack of high energy spots.There was also some controversy at this event as fans were upset that the advertised main event, a Fatal 4-Way featuring Nakamura vs. Joe vs. Roode vs. Dillinger, was changed to the six-man tag without notice. Fans booed when the main event change was announced and the crowd partially hijacked the match as it happened.
This is mostly hearsay and speculation, and there's been no official announcement of an injury to Samoa Joe as of yet. If anything changes, we will keep you updated.
