wrestling

Court Bauer Says He Met With WWE About Working With Them On Lucha Underground

November 8, 2022 | Posted by Jeremy Thomas
Court Bauer MLW Image Credit: MLW

Court Bauer recently recalled meeting with WWE officials about potentially working with them in some capacity on Lucha Underground. The MLW owner recently spoke on AdFreeShows’ The Insiders about his involvement in bringing the now-defunct El Rey-backed Lucha Underground to WWE for a potential partnership, as well as why it didn’t ultimately come to pass. You can check out some highlights below, per Fightful:

On meeting with WWE over Lucha Underground: “I set up a meeting with Paul Levesque to go up there and explore what a future could look like in some capacity with Lucha Underground and WWE’s participation. For example, was there a world where Lucha Underground could be on WWE Network as original programming or is there a scenario where they were interested n possibly acquiring it or licensing seasons to air for archival reasons? We went to Stamford, I picked up Dorian Roldan and one of the principal investors, Alex Garcia. It was an interesting time. We went in and Paul Levesque and his team were incredibly gracious and very flattering toward all three of us in the meeting. It was a very ‘getting to know you’ meeting. We met in the Money in the Bank boardroom.”

On why the deal didn’t get worked out: “In the end, it was really up to the ownership of Lucha Underground and WWE to decide if there was a future there and it kind of petered out after the meeting and didn’t go where it needed to go. With Lucha Underground, you didn’t just have Dorian and Alex Garcia, you had several people with a position in the company. Mark Burnett, MGM TV, other investors. To get everyone on the same page when you have multiple ownership groups, it’s a lot harder than when you have one guy running it or a managing director of the company or a sports team. That’s why it’s harder to be flexible and do deals. Lucha Underground was the bridge to what we have today in so many companies.”