In a recent interview with Ariel Helwani of BT Sport, WWE President Nick Khan discussed several topics, including the company’s recent releases, as well talent making the decision to join All Elite Wrestling.
Highlights of the interview are below:
On the recent talent releases: “There is a collective of us, keep in mind with WWE there is one boss and that’s Vince as we all know. Between Bruce Prichard who oversees the entire creative process, between Kevin Dunn who oversees all of our production, Stephanie McMahon, Paul Levesque, all are involved in these decisions with ultimately Vince making the final decision on things. I don’t think there is one explanation for it. Ultimately, what’s looked at is, is this person for us going to move the needle now, or in the imminent future. We had a two-day tryout in Las Vegas which Triple H, John Laurinaitis and Bruce Prichard were across, as were the rest of us, we’ve signed over a dozen new talent coming out of that tryout. I’m not suggesting that’s why we cut the other talent, but we’re always looking for what’s next, we live in the present and the future, we don’t live in the past, when people leave and move on with their life and careers, that’s good by us, for us it’s what works for us and our product at that moment in time and what’s going to work down the road and largely in par, the existing roster is based on that.”
On talent making the decision to join All Elite Wrestling post-release: “Have you ever seen me talk about or think about any competitor, never, it’s not what I do, it’s not what we do at WWE. What I do and what we do, we look ahead, where are we going. Jimmy Iovine said in the HBO documentary you have to look at these things like a horse in the race, they put blinders on, why, so you’re not looking back to see what the other horse is doing, the horse does that, they’re going to trip and break their leg. In my career, I’ve always operated that way, I know WWE has always operated that way, we look ahead, our decisions are based on what’s best for us. Whatever anyone else does with that, good for them.”
The interview is available in full at this link.
