To the surprise of many (including WWE talent) the announcement was made backstage at yesterday’s ECW/SmackDown tapings in London, England that Mike Adamle would replace Joey Styles full time as the play-by-play man for the ECW brand. It was later revealed in an announcement that was included on last night’s ECW on Sci-Fi broadcast that Styles would take over as the “Head of WWE.com.” In reality, the official WWE website will still be overseen by Brian Kalinowski but Styles will assume the managing editor role similar to what Michael Cole used to do for the website.
From what I understand the move was not made because of heat on Styles but is rather due to Adamle’s hefty contract. It is believed that Adamle is making in excess of $300,000 a year and officials within WWE (including Vince McMahon) felt like he was not being used enough for his price tag. Furthermore the feeling internally is that the official WWE website is struggling and they need someone with Internet experience. Prior to his stint with WWE, Joey Styles was the co-owner of the original ECW website (formerly located at ECWWrestling.com) and the 1Wrestling website. With Styles having a lot of knowledge in the Internet field, the company felt like he would be a good man to help improve the website which has become a significant piece of WWE.
Styles will not only continue to travel to ECW/SmackDown TVs each week but from what I understand, he will also travel to Raw on Monday nights. Styles will be based out of an office at WWE’s Corporate Headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut.
