This is a boneheaded move by WWE on many accounts, and I'm frustrated, upset, and not at all shocked by this decision.
Kaval had a lot of major draws. He was quick, not afraid to do the dangerous spots, unique, and he had grit. He was decent enough on the stick and was fantastic in his ring. His PPV match with Dolph Ziggler where he kicked Dolph's head into the middle of next week was very good, one of my favorite matches of Survivor Series.
Furthermore, the crowd was behind him. He hadn't been coming out to massive pops and Smackdown, but you can blame that on the fact that he wasn't exactly being pushed very hard. The truth is, he won NXT Season 2 mostly because of his exciting ability and the fact that the crowd knew he had potential, potential that he was seeming to fulfill by having tremendous matches on Friday nights and at Survivor Series.
He was also probably the best high flyer on Smackdown save Rey Mysterio. He was most certainly better than Evan Bourne whom, while exciting, does not have nearly the same intensity as Kaval. He was also better than Justin Gabriel whom really hasn't shown much out of his high flying arsenal besides a few weird kicks and a 450 splash. The rest of the high fliers in the WWE are barely high fliers, more guys who can use the ropes and make top rope moves look decent, which includes JoMo and Kofi among others. While I'm not saying Kaval is better than either JoMo or Kofi, he brought more to the table as a high flier than either of them.
However, I'm not surprised. He had a very lackluster push coming off of NXT. He got in his PPV match, which was good, but he also got bumped from a PPV by a newly re-debuting Tyler Reks, which really pissed me off at the time and it does today as well. He also probably could have been thrown into that Ladder match for the IC title. It was already a triple threat, why not throw in one more guy, and it's not like it was some new guy who had never jumped off a ladder before. The WWE totally blew his momentum coming off of NXT, and that's what got him released. I guess they felt they might as well send him off before they let his character become a burden to creative.
The WWE blew a huge opportunity here by letting a tremendous talent go. I hope they also know that they totally devalued NXT, as winning it no longer means that you will be WWE's next breakout star. Winning it means you may very well wind up WWE's next future endeavored.