Mustafa Ali On Why WWE Shortened His Name To Ali

WWE shortened Mustafa Ali’s name to Ali for a while until the new regime took over, and the 37-year-old wrestler explained during a conversation with WrestleBinge that it was done to tackle fan confusion over whether to chant his first or last name.

Ali will challenge GUNTHER for the WWE United States Championship at Night Of Champions 2023 in Saudi Arabia.

You can check out some highlights from the interview below:

On the reaction to his name being shortened: “I think people take things too personally. There’s a personal attachment to my name with Mustafa, it means something to me. But it wasn’t like they just sat around and said, ‘Hey, we are going to mess around with this guy and take away his name,’ it was a calculated decision.”

On the name being shortened to make fan chants easier: “They just couldn’t get on the same page. This happened over, and over, and over again so the resolution was, if they only had one name to chant that’s what they’re going to chant. I pleaded my case, ‘Oh if you just refer to me as Ali but I have a full name,’ it was a decision that was made and it worked.”

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