Freddie Prinze Jr. on How Recent WWE Releases Make Him Want to Start His Own Wrestling Brand

– Actor and former WWE writer Freddie Prinze Jr. joined The Ariel Helwani Show this week, and he discussed wanting to start an indie wrestling promotion due to the recent WWE releases and more. Below are some highlights (via Fightful):

Freddie Prinze on the recent WWE releases making him want to start a wrestling brand: “It makes me want to start a wrestling brand is what it makes me want to do. Everybody sees that and they get sad. I see it and I get hungry. I was in Karrion Kross’ DMs, for real, the day it [his release] happened. I was like, ‘Hey man, I didn’t go back to work for fun. I went back to work to invest in things.’ Imagine having Keith Lee and Karrion Kross on the same roster and making people wait to watch them fight, keeping their stories connected but separate. Even if it was just Indie shows, which is what it would have to be, I’m not trying to go in for $50 million on something, but there is so much talent out there now, that I think people would love to watch. They literally had evil Macho (Man Randy Savage) and evil Elizabeth with Karrion and Scarlett. I loved them. Then they separate them, bring him up, destroy his entire look. That kind of stuff makes me want to take my finances from one idea and put them into a brand new one, which I’ve flirted with before and maybe one day I’ll do, but when I see those releases, it makes me think about it more seriously.”

On his interest in running a wrestling promotion: “Yeah, in an independent fashion, never on a huge main scale thing. I’ve flirted with Brian Kendrick’s wrestling pro wrestling, which is basically cosplay wrestling like Kids in the Hall and Vince McMahon had a baby and if it wanted to start its own wrestling brand, it would be this. I’ve flirted with that a bit, talked to networks and TV rights and do things the Jim Cornette way, as far as the business model goes. I can’t book, so maybe I’d need help with that, but I can give a crap about the person I want you to give a crap about. It’s something I think about, often. Before I took the Netflix movie, I spoke with my accountant about, ‘Hey, if I wanted to screw around with an Indie wrestling league, what would I need to do?’ He said, ‘You need to do A, B, and C.’ I did A. I’m getting ready to do B and C. If I had like a local LA Indie show with a small TV deal, there are a thousand TV channels, I don’t care which one it is on, if I’m financing the thing they don’t have to worry about anything but getting content. It’s definitely something I’ve invested time and energy in, just no money yet.”