Select Answers: Promotions AEW or TKO could acquire, house shows, AEW in other markets (Patreon)

Welcome to Select Answers, a feature that provides some of the answers to questions that were posed to Sean Ross Sapp in the most recent Fightful Weekly Q&A Podcast. The show drops every week on Fightful Select for subscribers.

When aggregating these posts please refer to it as "Fightful Select Answers Q&A" and tag Fightful, noting that it was in the Q&A format to avoid confusion.

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With your best and honest guess, which promotions (if any) are closer to being acquired by either WWE/TKO or AEW? Not specifically asking based on speculation, just by personal perception. Just curious given the current situation with the economy and the fact that we’re near another recession.

I would not be surprised if TKO eventually acquires the Lucha Underground IP. I don't know what's going on with that right now, but something is, and I think WWE would be interested in doing something with it. For AEW, I don't think they're going to be interested in companies as much as libraries for their MyAEW service. I think their audience specifically would love the PWG library and access to it as a part of that service.

With WWE announcing a run of house shows throughout the summer, will we be seeing more of them from now on to redress the balance between "not enough" and too many? And have they convinced TKO/the shareholders that house shows are worth doing in the long run despite seeming "unprofitable?"

Well, Wrestlevotes Radio reported that if the summer series goes well, they will consider doing a set of winter live events well. I think that bringing them in maybe quarterly or bi-annually in North America is a really good approach. I especially think that doing them when a bunch of NXT talent get called up so they can specifically get reps on the main roster and work a variety of other talent. We also live in a content creation world, and there's a lot of that which will emerge from those.

Hey SRS, you mentioned on the last Mailbag that you think AEW should run other markets. Any possibility or potentially discussed plans for AEW to run a TV taping or house show in Germany or mainland Europe?

It's always a thing and a possibility that is discussed. I haven't heard of anything remotely imminent, because they usually let the world know well ahead of time. I would be surprised to see them go to those places in 2026 besides the things that they have already announced. I think they'll start expanding into a new market each year at least.