In September 2023, WWE informed Mustafa Ali that he had been released from his contract. During a recent interview on "Insight With Chris Van Vliet," Ali detailed another layer of that fateful day, one that specifically centered around his wife.

"I s*** you not, five minutes goes by [after getting the call about the release] and her phone rings," Ali recalled. "She picks it up. People don't know this, months before all this happened, my wife was having really bad neck pain. We switch out the pillows, I tell her to go get a massage, and it would just get worse and worse and worse to the point where it was debilitating pain. I was like 'What's going on?' We take her to the doctor, so her doctor calls and 'Yeah, you have a broken neck and you need surgery.' The day I got let go, like 10 minutes later, five minutes later, we find out that she's got a [broken neck], my attention, all of my energy, my focus goes [to her]."

According to Ali, he received the call from WWE while doing a cardio workout downstairs in his home. Naturally, the former Retribution leader then walked upstairs to relay the information to his wife, while also reassuring her that he'd figure out his next steps. Minutes later, his wife got the aforementioned phone call from her doctor. Luckily, with the help of some doctor friends, the pair were able to schedule the required surgery for her a short time after.