Recently released WWE star addresses misconception regarding failed faction, Vince McMahon's idea
Former WWE Chairman Vince McMahon was allegedly the brain behind a failed gimmick. The wrestler who portrayed chose not to address the silliness of the gimmick to McMahon.
Donovan Dijak's WWE contract expired on June 28, 2024, and he is now wrestling on the independent circuit. Dijak discussed his time on RAW during the pandemic, performing under the ring name "T-Bar," which was a Vince McMahon idea. He was part of a faction dubbed Retribution led by another released WWE star, Mustafa Ali.
Speaking to WrestleZone's Bill Pritchard, Dijak clarified that those who were part of the group were totally invested in it. They did everything they could with what they were given. Unfortunately, the idea itself was silly to begin with:
"I think a lot of people misconstrue what I say about my opinions about Retribution and think, oh, he didn’t care. He wasn’t invested. I’ll say this; as many times as I possibly can and I’ll say it about everybody in the group. Nobody was more invested in Retribution than we were. We desperately wanted to make that work," he said.
Dijak further articulated about their individual efforts, from shaving his head for the new role and changing his voice, to Mace (Brennan Williams) designing a logo for the group. He then got to Mr. McMahon's idea of "T-Bar," which is why he did not bother to challenge the former WWE Chairman:
"Even though it sounds terrible, I can make… What if we do this? What if I am a maniac?’ You know? And we knew that if we were allowed to, we could make this good. The reality is, we weren’t really allowed to. So from that aspect… I don’t want the misconception, because I know there is a misconception that I thought Retribution was stupid so we just threw our hands in the air and gave up. We did not. We did the exact opposite." [H/T: WrestleZone]
Dijak on his "horrible" first meeting with Vince McMahon
Dijak moved from NXT to RAW during WWE's ThunderDome Era on account of the COVID-19 pandemic. He recounted meeting Vince McMahon for the first time and immediately thinking to himself that he was finished.
McMahon did not know who he was, which meant that things were not going to go well for him, according to Dijak. He talked about waiting for some time, which "felt like a half hour," before finally getting to speak with the former WWE Chairman. Dijak then detailed their interaction:
"He looks at me, smiles, and waves, I walk over and introduce myself. ‘Nice to meet you. I’m Dominik Dijakovic from NXT. I just got called up. I wanted to know if there is anything you’re looking for specifically.’ ‘Have you talked to Bruce Prichard?’ ‘Yeah, I’ve talked to Bruce.’ ‘He does the creative stuff.’ From that moment, I was like, ‘I’m f***ed.’ He doesn’t know who I am," Dijak recalled. [H/T: Inside The Ropes]
Eventually, Dijak returned to NXT. After two years of finding reasonable success on the Tuesday show, he got drafted to RAW once again in April 2024. However, two months later, he was let go by WWE.