Quote:
Originally Posted by XL
Maybe The Rock could bankroll this company with Lesnar, Punk, and Rousey. Maybe they could get Jacob Fatu in (is he still in your/Cornette’s good graces?) and they could take over the world?
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Lol, yeah. Silly me, predicting that The Rock might get into the live entertainment. It's not like he then went on to buy a currently defunct football league or anything.
Brock Lesnar has a WWE asking price. I'd have a very high asking price too if I had to go out and perform in such a boring environment. New Japan absolutely could have made an offer to Brock. The increase you could potentially see in business could provide future dividends. Sinclair are a multi-billion dollar entity. If they wanted to, they could offer Brock every bit of $12 million to appear for a few PPVs and use that to segue into a cable TV deal that blows AEW out of the water. Those rights fees can add revenue streams while they don't actually have to lose what ROH already brings them (in fact, it'd likely become more popular).
MLW don't have much capital themselves, but they are connected to entities that desperately want (in some cases,
need to expand). Signing wrestling stars to perform on their wrestling properties so they can increase their revenue from their wrestling makes sense. If DAZN and BeIN Sports split the costs of a few Lesnar dates between them, having Brock on their content could potentially allow a network deal of even just $25 million to be made, which covers Brock and allows MLW to make the big plays to future talent to also draw people in. This goes to DAZN's specials and the BeIN ratings too.
There is definitely room in the world for a new default #2 promotion. AEW is only there because the Khans had the money and the connections to sign Jericho and JR and get the TNT deal before any content was actually produced. Tell me I'm lying, lol. Since then, they've signed NO real stars (Luke Harper, Matt Hardy and The Revival don't really count as being on that level). It's been a bust in terms of the potential. If
anything else comes along, it's got a real good shot at supplanting AEW, as long as it actually has the platform to compete. If TNT wants wrestling, they'd probably prefer that wrestling over #3. I just cut out the middle-man there.
Rock puts $7 million into a wrestling promotion and you don't think there is anyone with money out there that isn't going to cover the rest of the bases to get something off the ground? And you don't think Dwayne fucking Johnson -- the biggest star in Hollywood right now, and the guy who turned ripped people hitting watermelons with hammers or whatever into a 3 million viewer hit on NBC -- isn't going to be able to walk out of an interview with some TV executives with a giant sack of TV rights money? It's literally a license to print thanks to where television is right now.
May 2021. That's the ideal announcement time. Because that's when Ronda Rousey gets out of her WWE deal (which they could possibly elongate because of her time off if they know in advance). It's also sweeps time and upfronts. Imagine The Rock showing up at one with Ronda and showing a promo for his new wrestling promotion to launch over the summer or whatever. Instant storm of attention.
ROH and MLW getting major cash flow injections is the other. Sinclair and DAZN want to play. You need to pay to play. But any of these things pisses all over the vanity project on TNT.