In this WrestleTalk News, there are apparently more Vince McMahon allegations coming out
soon, women backstage in WWE are a touch unhappy, an update on Bayley’s return and more.
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It’s been just over a month since the Wall Street Journal published a story that claimed
Vince McMahon had an affair with a WWE employee then paid her $3 million dollars as a ‘separation
agreement’.
The WWE board announced they would investigate the matter, and Vince stepped down as CEO
of the company - replaced by his daughter Stephanie McMahon - but continues his role
as Head of Creative for the shows.
McMahon himself made several appearances on Raw and SmackDown, with Fightful Select reporting
that Vince’s attitude was “f**k ‘em” with regards to the allegations.
While the story was a bit gross - with one part of it alleging that McMahon passed the
employee to Head of Talent Relations John Laurinaitis “like a toy”, there is - in
theory - nothing illegal.
The story says that McMahon used his own money to pay the woman off, not company money.
The big issue for the Board would have been if McMahon really did double her salary after
their relationship began.
The second story, released a couple of weeks ago, was much worse.
The second Wall Street Journal article alleges that McMahon paid over $12 million in hush
money over the last 16 years to four women to “suppress allegations of sexual misconduct
and infidelity” - including a former wrestler who, after turning down sexual advances by
McMahon, was demoted and then not re-signed in 2005.
Another was sent unsolicited nudes by McMahon, and was said to have been sexually harassed
on the job.
But nothing has changed much in WWE since the second story; Stephanie is still the interim
CEO, the board are doing their investigation, and Vince McMahon is still Head of Creative
- though he hasn’t appeared on TV following the second Wall Street Journal article which,
let’s be honest, we all thought he would.
John Laurinaitis, however, was placed on administrative leave with Bruce Prichard taking over his
role.
The most striking thing for me about this story is the mainstream publicity it's starting
to get, and how it has shined a light onto the quiet shadowy world of professional wrestling.
I’ve now made two appearances on The Law & Crime Network - which has over 3 million
subscribers - to talk about these stories and - believe me - they couldn’t quite figure
out why Vince was parading himself on TV when he was under investigation for potential sexual
misconduct.
Because, outside of the wrestling bubble, that’s a weird thing to do.
And that mainstream eye could only get worse for Vince and WWE, as Mike Johnson of PWInsider
is reporting that more stories are being worked on about McMahon - by mainstream news outlets.
HBO’s Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel has reportedly been reaching out to former female
talent in WWE for a story about McMahon’s allegations on their TV show, and the Wall
Street Journal are working on a third story about Vince, which is expected to be released
in the next couple of weeks.
They have also been trying to connect with former female wrestlers who worked for WWE.
But do you think it’ll make a difference?
Do you think that a third story from the Wall Street Journal, or HBO’s Real Sports giving
it further TV coverage will push Vince out, or speed up the investigation?
Let me know in the comments down below.
But when it comes to the current female talent in WWE, there’s also some frustrations over
the creative.
To paraphrase the great Sinaed O’Conner, it’s been several hours and 63 days - bloody
hell that’s a great song - since Sasha Banks and Naomi walked out on WWE over frustrations
with their creative, but nothing official has been confirmed - etc, etc, we don’t
know what’s going on.
But these frustrations over creative weren't seemingly just shared by Banks and Naomi,
as according to a new Fightful Select report, things only got good for the women’s division
recently in terms of creative.
Sean Ross Sapp has learned of “several female talent that were frustrated with their utilization
on [Raw and SmackDown], from the bottom of the card all the way to the top” during
the Spring period.
Apparently there had been growing frustrations backstage over the booking of certain female
talent on both shows, with Fightful noting that Alexa Bliss, Shotzi, Aliyah, Xia Li,
Doudrop, and Nikki A.S.H had not been used in the weeks leading up to WrestleMania which,
“surprised many” according to the report.
However, no one spoke up about this as they were waiting for things to fall into place
- like the returns of Lacey Evans and Asuka, as well as Charlotte Flair taking time off,
and Ronda Rousey coming back into the company - before taking any of these complaints to
the higher ups.
Rousey, according to this report, has been more than willing to work with a variety of
talent on SmackDown - with her photographer even claiming that it was her call to have
Liv Morgan cash in on her at Money in the Bank to win the SmackDown Women’s Championship.
And Fightful note that since May 13th, there has been more effort put in place to feature
women on both Raw and SmackDown in more prominent roles with, “varying creative satisfaction.”
Though, I would argue, it’s still better than AEW’s women’s division.
May 13th may sound like a familiar date to you, but that might just be that it was three
days before Banks and Naomi walked out on WWE over their creative frustrations.
According to Fightful Select, Banks and Naomi leaving “accelerated” the decisions to
feature women more on the shows.
The most damning part of this report, however, comes at the end, where one source told SRS
that, “Vince McMahon was more concerned with squeezing himself onto television after
the Wall Street Journal story than actually making sure female talent was booked and protected
on the show.”
But how would we know that John Cena was going to be on Raw the following week, even though
they’d announced it earlier in that same episode… and two weeks prior to that.
Another bit of news that might further accelerate the wild idea of putting women on TV in prominent
roles, is the return of Bayley.
It had been reported that Bayley was training for her in-ring at the Performance Center
in Orlando a couple of weeks ago, and a new report from Mike Johnson of PWInsider is claiming
that she is currently scheduled to be in Nashville for Summerslam.
Johnson doesn’t state whether Bayley is making her return at that show, just that
she will be there.
Bayley herself has seemingly addressed this rumour on Twitter, pointing out to fans that
they should “respect the injured”, and when someone made a joke tweet about a source
confirming that she would be attending a Paramore show later this year, Bayley responded: “Well,
there’s ONE true rumor.”
And Bayley might not be the only star returning soon…
…as Kevin Owens is reportedly set to be on Raw tonight for a KO Show segment, according
to Fightful Select.
Owens hasn’t been on WWE TV since June 26th, when he was pulled from his match against
Ezekiel for a spot in Money in the Bank.
Fightful note that while Kevin Owens is scheduled for tonight’s Raw, plans can change.
Especially as WWE have not advertised this to be happening.
Not that advertising something that won’t happen has never stopped them before.
Switching over to news outside of WWE now, and it was reported over the weekend by Cassidy
Haynes of Bodyslam.net that former ROH Champion Michael Elgin was arrested in Japan before
he was scheduled to make an appearance at Pro Wrestling NOAH.
NOAH announced that he would no longer be at the event, and Haynes is reporting the
reason for this is because Elgin was arrested for stealing protein powder and was sat in
jail at the time of the show.
Haynes reports that Elgin could face up to five years in prison unless a deal was reached,
and even then he would be deported back to Canada and never allowed in Japan ever again.
This is the second arrest for Elgin in a year, as he was arrested last July for violating
a protection order filed by his ex-fiance.
Elgin was also accused of misconduct during the Speaking Out movement in 2020, and was
fired by IMPACT Wrestling as a result.
Elgin has since denied the story on Twitter, saying that he was not charged with anything
nor was he in jail and was instead heading back to Canada to be with his family following
the passing of a family member.
He also notes that he’s flying first class, which “Doesn’t seem like deportation”.
Over in AEW land now and an update on the status of Santana, who picked up injury during
the Blood & Guts match on Dynamite a few weeks ago.
Fightful Select are reporting that Santana sustained an ACL injury, which sources say
could put him on the shelf for 8-12 months.
Santana was in Puerto Rico this weekend to relinquish the LAWE World Championship, and
was spotted on crutches, with sources saying that he had not had surgery.
Santana had seemingly been counting down his days to leave AEW going by his Twitter, with
several reports saying that he was unhappy with the company and that there was a rift
between him and tag parter Ortiz.
Santana had been accepting indie bookings as a singles star prior to the injury.
We wish Santana the speediest of recoveries.
And finally the train may be pulling into spoiler station for this weekend’s Death
Before Dishonor, so if you want to stay Spoiler Free I’d suggest clicking another WrestleTalk
News video in 3…2…1.
It was announced on last Friday’s Rampage that Jonathan Gresham would defend the ROH
World Championship against Claudio Castagnoli in the main event of Death Before Dishonor.
However, Gresham filmed a match for an episode of AEW Dark which is set to air over the next
few weeks, and he did that taping without the ROH World Championship - which would indicate
that Castagnoli is winning the title.
However, the taping of the match would air this week, which would be ahead of
the ROH PPV.