JBL Addresses WWE-Related Criticism Aimed At ‘Road Dogg’ Brian James

JBL is pushing back hard against criticism directed at Road Dogg following his WWE departure.

Road Dogg’s exit from WWE earlier this year sparked a wide range of reactions from fans and industry figures alike. While some questioned his work as part of the SmackDown creative team, others came to his defense, pointing to WWE’s continued business success during his tenure.

Speaking during a recent Q&A on Something To Wrestle (see video below), JBL didn’t hold back when addressing the negative comments surrounding Road Dogg’s time on the creative side of WWE.

“These guys that are out there, they’re talking about Road Dogg didn’t go a good job, man f**k you. It’s just bullsh*t. These guys are selling out arenas all over the world, making more money, we never dreamed that people would make money like this. Road Dogg was one of the guys behind it.”

JBL went on to discuss the realities and challenges that come with producing live television every week, noting that mistakes are inevitable in a business that never stops moving.

“I can tell you all of the things that Vince [McMahon] failed with. I can also tell you that Vince bought a company from his father for a million dollars and sold it for $9.3B and somehow retrained control. That’s Game Of Thrones sh*t. But do you fail a lot? Absolutely. When you got 52 weeks a year live, no reruns, do you think you’re going to make some mistakes? I would hope so because if you’re not making mistakes, you’re not trying. This isn’t a TV episode show where you can do 13 episodes and you film it, you put it in a can and then if you don’t like it, you go back and edit it. This is live. You’re talking about people who may or may not deliver what you’re thinking they’re going to deliver. Sometimes they do something that is not what they’re supposed to do. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. If it doesn’t work, you get the blame for that too. There’s a lot of things going on.”

The WWE Hall of Famer also compared WWE’s weekly production schedule to other wrestling promotions, arguing that the scale of WWE’s content output makes the job significantly more difficult.

While praising his experience working with AAA, JBL emphasized that it is a completely different environment compared to WWE’s nonstop schedule.

“I love AAA and I love working down there, I think it’s the hottest show in the world right now. It’s a lot easier what they’re doing, when you’re filming an hour a week and you’ve got great stars as compared to filming 50 hours a week or whatever WWE does. You’ve got great stars there too, but it’s just — it’s not even hardly the same business. It’s tough to do what they’ve done. I think Road Dogg did an excellent job. Those guys who are complaining about it, man, f**k you.”