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On whether the Vince McMahon allegations would have killed WWE's Netflix deal:
"I don't know about killed, but it certainly wouldn't have helped the deal. So those allegations are obviously horrific and serious, and we'd take them and interpret them the same way I think every other reasonable person or organization would take them."
Whether Netflix told WWE to have McMahon resign:
"No. Not involved in any way."
Vince exiting:
"He chose to resign."
The Peacock relationship, Wrestlemania 41:
"Look specifically, they're up March of '26 and for the wrestling fans out there, that means a month before WrestleMania 2026, which we like the timing of that...indoors, or maybe a little later in April. We're going through that now."
"WWE Network launched in 2014. That was certainly before my time here. The Peacock deal, I was in the middle of. So that deal was launched in March of '21.I started in August of '20. So I was in the middle of all of that, along with a number of other folks. What our though was, as at that time, in that era, the streaming wars were in full effect and people were spending a crazy amount of money. What the internal dialogue we had was, Hey, we're not a tech company. So to continue with our OTT Service,number one, Financially, we're not gonna be able to compete technologically in terms of making sure that it's up to date and up to speed. Number two, at a certain point, the bottom is going to fall out here and people are going to have to cancel some subscriptions at 10 a month in the United States."
"For us, it was again in the United States, $10 a month, or on the ad supported tier, $5 a month for Peacock. And, oh, by the way, our fans, you can also get. Olympics and the Office and Yellowstone, NFL playoff games and all of the other accoutrements there. So we believed in them early. We believed they could get it up to speed. Even the article that came out the other day about how many of the people who subscribed for the NFL game have stuck as subscribers. That's good for us. 74 percent. Look, our incumbents are always the priority. They're the incumbent on the premium live event deal, the Peacock deal and we'll see what they have to say when the time is ready."
The Rock getting involved with the TKO Board:
"It's something that so the first day, the bell ringing day for TKO was September 12th. Of course, no one's gonna go the day prior to that. So it's Tuesday, September 12th. So the conversation that Ari, Mark, Andrew, myself, others was a Dwayne Johnson could be really interesting for the Board. Brad Slater, who's an agent there [at Endeavor] ....Ari [Emanuel' and Brad have been across Dwayne's business for a long period of time, but the idea of Dwayne and having his input on TKO Which is you just articulated is part WWE was something we were desirous of. So in having a ongoing dialogue with Dwayne over the last two plus years about when you're gonna come back, it finally made sense to him. The why...he would always say I need to figure out the why, the why. I think the interesting part for him as he's developed all of these other businesses Is now he sits on the board of a publicly traded company that has, in my opinion, an incredibly strong valuation And that's great for him, and it's great for us that we can have him back on camera in the ring doing what he does."
The Rock in Hollywood:
"Listen, here's what I know. Our fans love him. I think he loves our fans. Wrestling's in his blood. Third generation. But that was the whole thing. No question, by the way, it's one of the great career pivots that I've seen. So even, you talk about the kids movies, he was also like in the Get Shorty sequel. Which, if you're like, I didn't even know there was a Get Shorty sequel. He was in that. He had slimmed down considerably. It wasn't the right role for him. And boom, he came back as, okay, I'm going to be the leading man who I am. [His next film] Smashing Machine. So it's his first, I think from what I understand, like not a hundred million dollar picture since he's become a big megastar. So he goes into that a week or two after WrestleMania. Yeah. And then goes into live Moana after that, which knock on wood should be a big hit."
The fans reacting to Cody being pushed aside by The Rock:
"I've seen one or two one or 200 pieces on it. Look, the bottom line is this, Cody Rhodes is in the main event against our champion Roman Reigns on Sunday night. So Cody gets his shot. The wrestling parlance right now is Cody gets to try to finish his story."
The Creative Process post-Vince McMahon:
"Triple H is in charge of all of creative, terrific executive, great creative mind. He is also owed a lot of credit for the rating success that we've had recently. Rock is talking to Triple H all the time about his creative which he's certainly in wrestling parlance. [Rock has become] A hardcore heel, which I think excites him because he's playing the character. If you see him. In my opinion, if you see him on social media as Dwayne Johnson, that is the authentic Dwayne Johnson. It's what I think resonates most for him is..[former HBO head] Richard Pleplersaid this line years ago. It's not my original thought. When your inner voice matches the outer voice, you tend to have a shot to succeed. Whether that's your new multi millionaire status at Puck, whether that's me as a mid level wrestling executive. It tends to work over time, even if sometimes you have to say something negative. So for Dwayne getting to pay, play this monster heel, this villainous bad guy, if you will, I think it's been exciting for him and it certainly has worked."
Potentially acquiring others pro wrestling:
"Yes is the answer to that. I'm not going to tell you yet, but the growth opportunity right now is in the international live events, which I mentioned earlier. Also, we think WWE has a treasure trove of intellectual property that has not been mined. So the characters that were created over time at WWE, the Undertaker, things like that."
Using the IP of characters without the original person performing:
"I think for example, an Undertaker horror type movie to me would work. An origin story on him or on a wrestler who unfortunately passed away not too long ago named Bray Wyatt, who was one of these over the top characters."
His goal for success over the next 3-5 years:
"So the first full capacity WrestleMania that we did after I started. So with our current team in place was the first two night full capacity WrestleMania. It worked. Our ticket sales this year are more than twice. What they were in 2022. So it's how do you maximize revenue, which out without pricing a family out? It's very simple. The rich folks like yourself, we price the ringside seats far greater than we used to, because if there's an event you want to go to, you're going to pay what you want to pay to go. The upper bowl seats, we keep them family friendly and boom, changing the upper bowl seats doesn't change the economics of a venue deal that much."
"If people think they're close to maximizing dollars on their current product. Go create a new product. So that's something that we're in the middle of. Even if you look, we have a, what I think is a pretty substantial deal with A& for documentaries and unscripted programming, what more do they want to do? What does Disney want to do?"
WWE-UFC crossover:
"We're predetermined. We think our athletes are the best in the world and all of those great things. Those guys are fighting each other for their lives and their livelihood. And it's a great sport and they've done tremendous jobs. I think Mark Shapiro said at a conference a couple of years ago, Hey, we think UFC is the number four sport in the country. So do we at WWE think that UFC has earned that status? People talk about it. It's pervasive. It's penetrated society when people, Hey, you might say to your kid, Hey, I'm going to tap out. Hey, I'm done for the night. That's all UFC."
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