Mason Rook has broken his silence after being pulled at the last minute from Tuesday’s NXT, where he was set to challenge Grayson Waller for the WWE NXT Championship.
WWE announced a few hours before the show that Rook had not been medically cleared to compete. During the broadcast, Robert Stone said he had spoken with WWE doctors and was told that Rook will be out of action indefinitely.
Shortly afterward, Rook commented on the situation for the first time in a social media post.
“I’m sorry. Sometimes life is cruel. Every fibre of my being wanted to compete tonight but unfortunately it is out of my control. I promise this is just a speed bump and not a road block.”
So far, neither Rook nor WWE has disclosed the medical issue that kept him from competing, and there is no timetable for his in-ring return.
Rook earned the title shot on September 15 by defeating Tony D’Angelo and Saquon Shugars in a Triple Threat Match. The following week, he and Waller went face-to-face in an in-ring promo segment to build toward the title match.
With Rook unavailable, Stone turned Waller’s title defense into an open challenge. EK Prosper answered the challenge in the main event but came up short, and Waller remains NXT Champion.