When WWE Creative Found Out About Samoa Joe's Suspension

As noted, WWE announced on Wednesday that Samoa Joe has been suspended for 30 days due to his first violation of the WWE Wellness Policy, effective Monday, February 24.

It was noted on Wrestling Observer Radio that the WWE creative team didn't find out about the suspension until it was announced by the WWE website yesterday.

As noted before, it was reported earlier this month, via @Wrestlevotes, that more WWE Wellness Policy suspensions could be coming and the report strongly indicated that Joe was one of the violations. It was then reported, via PWInsider, that WWE sources "vociferously denied" Joe being suspended, which wasn't totally wrong as he was still working at that time and had not been suspended yet. It appears at least top WWE officials already knew of the suspension in early February, but that hasn't been confirmed. Now we know that the WWE creative team didn't find out until this week.

Joe will be able to return to the ring in late March, if he's medically cleared to compete from his most recent concussion. Before the suspension was announced, Joe was put on the shelf after suffering a reported concussion from taking a bad table dump during a WWE commercial shoot earlier this month, which would be Joe's second concussion in less than 1 month. Joe suffered a broken thumb back in September and didn't return to the ring on RAW until late December. He then suffered a concussion while doing a dive on the January 27 RAW episode, returned to action for one week, and then suffered the second concussion while filming the commercial.

Stay tuned for updates on Joe's suspension.