Bobby Roode and Eric Young Leaving TNA; What It Could Mean

After 12 years with TNA, Bobby Roode and Eric Young are leaving the company.

The exodus from TNA Impact Wrestling continues as two company originals and former world champions, Eric Young and Bobby Roode, have been granted their release.  They both apparently requested to be let go, a request that was granted, and their obligations were completed at last night’s Impact tapings in Orlando.

TNA confirmed the news in a press statement that includes comments from both superstars.

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Roode says, “To the guys and girls I got to work with for the past 12 years, Impact Wrestling, the office and everyone associated with me getting to live this dream, I say thank you. It is time for me to move on to the next chapter in my life. This has been amazing.”

Young added,  “Thank you. Thank you to everyone who watched me for the past 12 years. Thank you to Impact Wrestling. I wish everyone here nothing but the best going forward.”

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Unlike many other contacts, theirs do not carry a no-compete clause, meaning we could see either man elsewhere very soon. This has to feel strange for Roode’s longtime tag team partner, James Storm, another TNA veteran who left the company last year. He spent a  few weeks in NXT, made a surprising splash, but ultimately returned to TNA where he reformed Beer Money with Roode, winning the TNA Tag Team Championships. Now he’s on his own again. With Roode as tag team champion and Young as King of the Mountain champion, TNA was forced to resolve their situations at last night’s tapings.

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This is more than just a blow to the TNA roster’s star power. Losing Roode and Young is another case of a homegrown company talent departing for greener pastures. Obviously, the speculation is that they’ll follow AJ Styles to WWE, but neither man has the international reputation he commanded. It’s probably not a coincidence they timed this release together. Young and Roode came into TNA as members of the heel faction, Team Canada, and their characters have been associated ever since. They’ve also spent time in WWE before but never as more than jobbers, and even tagged together on a few occasions.

On paper, this seems like an opportunity for TNA to push someone young and new  into their spots, but we’ve seen the company be reluctant to build stars recently, with the exception of EC3.  This decimates TNA’s tag team division, which Beer money was the centerpiece of with The Wolves injured. Losing Young also hurts TNA’s upper-mid card, where he had been a staple for the last few years.

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That said, it was beginning to look like Roode and Young had done everything they could do in TNA, and were simply treading water.