Jim Ross has shared his beliefs regarding the factors that influenced Vince McMahon’s decision to promote him to WWE’s Head of Talent Relations. With his numerous years of experience in the industry and his non-wrestler status, Ross speculates these elements played a major role in his appointment.
Ross held a fundamental position in the WWE during his work period, taking up the role of EVP of Talent Relations. This position served as an expansion of his primary task of managing the recruitment of new wrestling talent.
In a recent episode of his podcast, “Grilling JR”, he shed light on the reasons he thinks motivated Vince McMahon to assign him to that role. Ross discussed,
“He trusted my experience and my logic and he saw how I communicated with the talents. Poor J.J [Dillon] kind of aged out, and J.J is a good man — really a good man — but Vince had seen him too much. J.J allowed himself to get overexposed.”
“He thought, here’s a man who has over 20 years of experience, is passionate about the game, and doesn’t hanker after any particular positions or roles, including being a manager or talent – which I never did. My goal was to contribute towards the company’s achievement… I believe I was seen as having too much control.”
In 2012, Paul ‘Triple H’ Levesque succeeded Ross as the EVP of Talent Relations while John Laurinaitis took up the mantle as the head of talent recruitment. Ross parted ways with WWE following an alleged intoxicated incident during a WWE 2K14 roster announcement, where he used explicit language and seemed disinterested.
However, less than a month after that incident, Ross announced his retirement from WWE, steadfastly refuting any suggestions that he was inebriated during the incident.