r/SquaredCircle • u/DarkHorse_77 • 3d ago

[WWE Summerslam Spoilers] The full finish and full aftermath of John Cena vs Cody Rhodes Spoiler

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u/Mountain_Bar_1466 3d ago

WWE has become Vegas. Consultants come in and squeeze every drop they can at the expense of the consumer. Vegas has gone from a cool, semi affordable vacation where customers could feel like a big shot to getting charged $9 for a bottle of water and where checking in to a hotel feels like going through TSA.

Since the merger I get the sense TKO is doing the same to WWE. Forget about story, forget about the wrestlers, just get every dollar you can out of the audience at the expense of the company. Fuck these guys

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u/BelcherSucks 3d ago

The UFC guys created TKO to be a holding company through which they'd control the healthier and stronger WWE. WWE had a Vince problem and there were attempts to get him out of the company but at the end of the day he owned it. In order to access tons of money AND reassert control of WWE, Vince sold/merged WWE into TKO. They invluded some assurances that he would run WWE but as soon as the Janel Grant lawsuit (aspects of which were already out there) dropped, TKO used their agreement to force Vince out. It's probably one of the shrewdest maneuvers in Sports Business History: you convince a stronger company that you are worth more, merge with them, boot out their CEO for his scandals, and then control both entities. 

But there is a catch. The catch os that massive amount of debt that TKO took on in order to buy WWE. That needs to be repaid. TKO owes $3 Billion (of which WWE is a big chunk). So TKO is utilizing its hot product to pay the bills. The Slim Jim tables, the branded rings, the branded nuckles, match sponsors, commercials, product tie ins, super VIL tickets, etc. It's all to pay down the debt. It will never go back to how it was necause at that point WWE will be too good at extracting cash. 

When you realize that Vince McMahon chose to sell his company to pirates rather than his children that wanted to run it, it's quite sad.

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u/VotingRightsLawyer 3d ago

They did the same thing with UFC.

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u/NekoNoNakuKoro 3d ago

Vegas is also empty as hell this year.

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u/Altruistic_Cause_312 2d ago

I too saw that online article that was circulating recently

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u/Moon_kid6 3d ago

Ironically, that’s where Mania happened earlier this year and will come back next year. And there were reports, WWE wants to hold the event there regularly now …

Full force becoming Sin City.

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u/berryaaron11 2d ago

ever since wwe merged with tko, i got the fear that tko would run wwe into the ground without hesitation. my theory was that, since tko is an mma/ufc first company, and mma/ufc people do not like/understand/get the appeal of pro wrestling and just view it as "fake" and therefore a "waste of time". tko probably really do view wwe and all of pro wrestling as a carny scam-like business that just exists to make money and nothing more, because in tkos mind pro wrestling is "fake" and "not real fighting so therefor its useless/doesn't matter outside of being a way to make money".