Earlier this week, Fightful Select reported that Sammy Guevara had once again been suspended by AEW. This would be his second suspension during his time with the company, with his first occurring in the summer of 2020 after a joke about wanting to sexually assault then-WWE star Sasha Banks resurfaced from a podcast back in early 2016. Guevara later apologized to Banks directly and underwent sensitivity training before returning to the promotion a month later.
This time, Guevara’s suspension is said to be related to his match with Jeff Hardy on the February 16th edition of AEW Rampage. Specifically, Guevara did not follow concussion protocol after Hardy suffered an injury by continuing their match for a short period instead of ending it right away. Now, however, more details have come to light on the suspension and the aftereffects of it.
Dave Meltzer reports in the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter that the AEW suspension committee made the decision to suspend Guevara as he did not follow concussion protocol during the match with Hardy. Hardy was suspected to have suffered a concussion when Guevara hit a shooting star press and hit him in the head with his knee upon landing.
Matt Hardy publicly and others privately have since expressed, however, that Jeff simply suffered a broken nose. Fears that Hardy had suffered a concussion led to Doc Sampson checking on him and the decision to go straight to the finish being relayed to Guevara.
Instead, however, the 30-year-old proceeded to have Hardy attempt to hit the Twist of Fate, only for him to counter into his GTH finisher before pinning Hardy. The feeling backstage is said to have been that Guevara should have ended the match straight away if it was feared Hardy was concussed and especially should not have hit his finisher, which consists of a knee strike to the head, given the circumstances. However, Meltzer also notes there is another side to the story defending Guevara in that there was a miscommunication between everyone involved.