Add as a preferred source on Google Royce Keys’s absence from WWE television after the Royal Rumble wasn’t the company’s decision. The wrestler himself asked Triple H to let him work dark matches every week before making his SmackDown debut.
In all, Keys worked nine dark matches between February 13 and April 6, winning every one of them. His opponents included Nathan Frazer, Rey Fenix, Motor City Machine Guns, Rayo Americano, Berto, and Brutus Creed. He made his SmackDown debut on April 10 with a win over Berto.
This wasn’t the first time Keys had addressed the topic. In April, on Notsam Wrestling Live!, he said the criticism over his apparent “disappearance” had even gotten to him. But Triple H, Bobby Roode, Cody Rhodes, and Randy Orton urged him to ignore the comments.
Now, in an interview with Baby Huey of 107.7 The Bone, Keys explained the reasoning behind that stretch of dark matches. It was part of a personal request to help him get up to speed in WWE:
“I didn’t know where I was going when I started, I just know that once I signed I was a WWE superstar.
“What I did ask of Hunter, and he had no problem with it and it was a ‘hell yeah’ was after I signed was to do dark matches every single TV taping. Every Raw, every SmackDown, every week for almost three months.
“Once I debuted at the Rumble people were like ‘where did he go?’, I was on the road every single week opening up the shows. Of course you’re not gonna see dark matches unless you’re in that city, but I was on the road, every single week, for about three months, doing dark matches, getting feedback, getting better.
“That’s what I was doing, so I’m throwing that out there for anyone saying I was missing or, what’s the word they used, I was buried or whatever the internet says, no, I was doing dark matches.
“The best training I was told is on the job training, and what better way to get on the job training than being in front of two live crowds every single week.”
The strategy paid off immediately. On April 17, Keys won the André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal. On August 1, he is set to make his SummerSlam debut alongside LA Knight and Solo Sikoa against Jacob Fatu and The Usos. On Thursday, July 23, his hometown even declared it Royce Keys Day.