More On Report Of WWE Sale To Endeavor, Backstage Reactions To News

It was reported on Sunday that WWE is in advanced talks to be sold to Endeavor Group, and a new report has some addition details on the situation. As noted earlier, CNBC reported that WWE is finalizing discussions for a sale to the owner of the UFC, with the plans being to create a new publicly traded company comprised of the UFC and WWE with Endeavor owning 51% percent of the company and WWE shareholders would getting 49%.

Fightful Select has not yet heard back from WWE officially for a request for comment, but they’ve spoken with a lot of talent and staff. So far, nobody has been briefed on the report, though many people were informed that the sale process was moving along well and there was some buzz this week among people in the company that a deal was being finalized with a non-Saudi Arabian buyer.

While WWE had said that they would be hosting potential buyers in Los Angeles over this weekend, the report notes that they’ve found out the deal had been in motion for a long time and had been in the works when Vince McMahon was set up with a two-year employment contract at WWE. It’s worth noting that Endeavor chose to keep Dana White in a head role when they bought the UFC in 2016, and sources with knowledge of the situation stated that McMahon would have had either protections to keep him around in some form or a big severance package if he were let go quickly.

As of now, there’s no word in regard to the plan for creative if the deal completes and how Triple H would stay involved; however, sources in Endeavor indicated that they had a trust in what they’ve seen out of him, as well as a level of “general respect” for what Stephanie McMahon accomplished before they left.

It was noted that Endeavor recently bought the non-scripted production company Asylum Entertainment Group, which operates in a field that WWE has a fair amount of experience in. Between that and the UFC, one Endeavor source noted that they believe if a sale takes place, it will provide more opportunities, mainstream and otherwise, for WWE talent without worry of losing them to outside projects since Endeavor is already in a good position to give those types of opportunities to WWE talent.

Another source noted that UFC fighters are allowed to have exclusive content pages with platforms like Onlyfans and Brand Army.

The sale has in general been a big talking point backstage today at WrestleMania, but talent are not certain exactly what’s going on no matter where they are on the card. Several talent reached out and said they were “ecstatic” that the company didn’t end up sold to a Saudi Arabia group. It was also noted that the WWE and Saudi Arabia relationship was set to continue.

Finally, some Endeavor-related guests could be in attendance as soon as tonight.