There were some rumors within WWE about Jim Ross being let go days before it actually happened. On September 10th, the day before Ross was let go, someone in WWE's book department called an author to tell him that WWE had chosen him to write JR's autobiography.
According to F4WOnline, one WWE source thought that it was weird for WWE to even publicize his retirement since if you are a casual viewer of the product you never see Ross anyway and would probably presume he'd already retired.
It was also noted that WWE cutting JR loose would never have happened even a few years back and that it proves that Vince McMahon doesn't care about TNA at all. Regarding JR's job working with talents in WWE NXT, there's speculation that William Regal may be the guy who takes those duties over.