By the time you read this Patrick Clark aka the Velveteen Dream may have finished competing at NXT Takeover XXX, and may again be the NXT North American Champion.  And if you’re like me you won’t be happy with that if it’s the result.  Now if you’re really like me then you aren’t happy that he was even on the show, or back on TV at all for that matter.

The accusations that have been made towards him are pretty disgusting, and as far as me and a lot of other people are concerned they’re credible enough to get him the hell out of here.  Now I’m no detective and no I have not investigated anything myself but I’ve been alive in this world long enough to know that most of the time when these kind of accusations are made they don’t end up being false.  At best you get a stalemate, where there isn’t enough to go to trial and get a conviction but nothing that truly exonerates the accused.  And that’s probably where this lands.  Yes there are tweets from his accusers with pictures and messages from Patrick that are pretty damning, but knowing how our legal system does and does not work it’s pretty naive to assume that some smoking gun has or will emerge that land him in jail, Law and Order style.

So that leaves it up to the court of public opinion, and from the looks of all my interactions that verdict has come back guilty.  And let me make it clear, I share in that opinion.  My official take is that he is guilty of something.  I can’t tell you exactly what but he did something wrong.  You don’t get this many credible accusations, with receipts, if you are free and clear and if there’s some proof that can take down the accusers accounts it usually is presented so we can all see it.  But that hasn’t happened so I and many others have decided that he’s guilty enough to get the hell outta here.  And that’s not all.  Some of his own coworkers have laid down their markers as far as how they feel about him coming back:

TONIGHT 8PM @USA_Network pic.twitter.com/Ck1MgrckjV

— Finn Bálor (@FinnBalor) August 19, 2020

So if his coworkers aren’t here for him, and the most vocal part of the fanbase is mostly done with him, then what’s the point in keeping him?  Well for your answer look to pro sports, the rest of the entertainment industry, and politics.  Across the board the approach to situations like this is to ride it out.  Say you didn’t do it, stand firm, let the legal side wash over, and then when it’s all said and done perform for the fans or deliver for your constituents to a level that they expect from you and everyone moves on.  It worked for Kobe Bryant, for Michael Jackson, countless actors, and elected officials from Ralph Nothram to Bill Clinton to Chris Christie.  To quote the great football coach Steve Spurrier when asked about a player who’d had some legal troubles, “he’s not in jail, is he?”  The belief here is that if there isn’t any evidence that can land him in jail then you take the heat upfront and in time this talented performer will make us all forget what happened, or at least compartmentalize it.    And say what you want, but it usually works because either enough people are willing to not believe the accusations or they just don’t care.

So am I giving WWE a pass here?  No.  It’s 2020 and you have a man on your roster who a lot of your fans believe is a pedophile and whose coworkers don’t kick it with.  This isn’t the old days where whatever foul stuff the boys were doing never gets past the rumor mill or the message boards.  This is out in the open on social media and it may get out further.  Firing a few guys in the UK doesn’t earn you a pass for trying to sneak one by here.  You’re risking losing fans here for supporting a guy who doesn’t deserve it and who more than likely won’t be bringing any return on investment any more.  That’s not going to change with time.  You’re not the NBA or NFL; there is a closer connection between the fans and the performers so we don’t see the guy as a knucklehead we see him as a problem and his actions as a betrayal of our trust.  There are plenty of other people on your roster who have not been accused of making advances at children who can be put in his spot.

As for how I’m dealing with this, well when he came out for his match I turned the TV off.  I responded to a company tweet and told them to fire the man.  I suggest you do similar things.  Don’t say his name on twitter (that counts as engagement even if you’re hate tweeting), don’t click on any videos with him in them, don’t give them any traffic on anything he’s in.  Support the people who haven’t been busted acting wild like that, and who have voiced their displeasure with having to deal with him.

But how do you know he’ guilty, Rob, when you haven’t done any kind of investigation?  

Like I said before I’ve lived long enough to feel pretty confident in judging the veracity of one’s accusations.  I’m not calling him guilty of any specific act here, and I have no idea if he’s committed any offenses that can get him tried and convicted in a court of law.  But again I believe he’s guilty of something, maybe not the exact thing he’s accused of here but I don’t believe he’s innocent.  And his coworkers aren’t here for him, not even one ‘I know Dream, and this doesn’t sound like him’.  In what is a very insular, circle the wagons kind of business that’s pretty telling in my book.  That’s enough for me to think that he’s not worth whatever potential reward you may think there is with him down the line.

But what if he is indeed innocent?

I still say let him go.  At best he’s shown some seriously faulty judgement and an inability to get along with his coworkers. It’s not 1985 where you could bury that kind of thing, and you’re not the NFL or NBA of MLB where people will turn their heads if he’s good enough at what he does.  Your fans are pissed over this, and they’re not going to forget.  I get it, the guy had megastar potential at one time.  That’s likely gone now even if he is totally innocent, because nothing about him says you can trust him going forward.  My twitter timeline may not be a true representation of what the fandom as a whole thinks, but the people I talk to who were fans of his are mostly done with him now.

Oh, so you’re ok with ruining his career if he’s innocent?

In the words of the old man, Patrick screwed Patrick.  Again, at best he has crappy judgement and his coworkers hate him.  Even if he proves his innocence, is he worth the headache?  No.  And quite frankly we as a society need to stop putting the careers of men above the safety and comfort of everyone else.  That’s always the last stand of the accused, to lean on how they’ve served us as an entertainer and put the responsibility on us for their careers.  Well, you can go jump in the lake with that.  If Patrick Clark wants to think that people like us ruined his career, let him think that.  And let’s be real it’s not like he won’t get booked somewhere else if WWE lets him go.  He will.

But in this case what I think is right is also what I think is, to quote HHH, best for business.  Don’t try to ride this one out guys, it’s not going to work.  Time to move on and wish him well on his future endeavors.