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Court Bauer On WWE’s “Major Fumble” With Lio Rush, Brian Pillman Jr.’s Status With MLW

November 17, 2020 | Posted by Blake Lovell

In a recent interview on The Wrestling Inc. Daily, MLW owner Court Bauer discussed WWE’s “major fumble” with Lio Rush, which night he wanted MLW’s Restart to air, and much more. Here are some of the highlights:

Court Bauer on working with Lio Rush and how WWE underutilized him: “Awesome, just a world-class athlete, world-class performer [and a] world-class guy,” Bauer expressed. “Usually when you have a guy that leaves a big system, especially WWE, sometimes they have a chip on their shoulder. They’re a diva. They’re difficult. They have it their way or the highway. It’s a process to kind of bring them down to earth. With Lio, he was just a totally totally different animal. Just awesome. Just awesome. Just a totally different breed than what we’re used to in that regard. He was just nothing but a positive experience and we’re very supportive of him.

“We think there’s a great platform for him. We think it’s a great place to have some great matches that are on his list. They’re on my list. When you bring a Lio Rush into your system, it makes my job easier because I can just put his name on one side of the paper, get my pencil, look at the other side of the roster and just connect him to all these different guys. Things just got easier with Lio Rush. He’s a phenomenal talent. To have him be available, for him to go into free agency to be available to us was shocking to me. That to me was a major fumble for WWE because that guy’s got IT.”

On Brian Pillman Jr.’s contract status after he originally expressed his desire to be released from his contract: “We made amends. I think with every promotion, there’s a rollercoaster ride with talent, and that’s okay. You hope that you can resolve the issues, and everyone feels good about it because there’s nothing worse than when you have this heaviness over you on either side, and you’re like, ‘Man this sucks.’ So I always try to make an effort to say, ‘Okay, let’s try to come out of this in a positive way.’ Whether you stay or you go, my obligation is to give the fans a good show. My obligation also is to build my business.

“My obligation also, I hope by the end of this, is that we continue our track record if guy stay or go, but at the end of their term with MLW, they’re in a better place than when they started with MLW. I think that’s going to be the way it is with Brian. Whether he stays or goes, he’s in a great place, and I think he’s going to be in a better place than when he started with 30 matches in July of 2018. He’s got a lot of passion. He’s got a lot of heart, and he’s put in a lot of work. And if you look at him and how he’s progressed over two years, he’s done an exceptional job. He really has. He’s found himself.”

On which night MLW wanted The Restart to air: “Well, I actually wanted Thursday nights, but I want to be a good partner. Our broadcast partners had wanted us to move to Wednesday’s, and so we said, okay, we’re going to be a good partner. We just asked that we maybe do it earlier or later and not head-to-head because I don’t think that’s a real win-win for fans. They already have two shows they have to pick from so let us be the lead in or the replay on the flip side. I was able to get both.”

article topics :

Court Bauer, Lio Rush, MLW, Blake Lovell