Last summer, WWE announced Money in the Bank 2022 for Sat., July 2 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. The move was indicative of a couple of company president Nick Khan’s strategies: to set an event schedule well in advance, and to run more stadium shows.
It didn’t work out in this case. WWE just moved Money in the Bank from Allegiant to MGM Grand Garden Arena, a smaller indoor venue, reportedly due to disappointing ticket sales.
One of the problems with Nick Khan’s idea is you don’t have a complete picture of what you’ll be competing with in a given market until closer to the show date. That seems to be one of the things that bit WWE with regards to Money in the Bank, which found itself up against UFC 276 on July 2 in Vegas.
There are lots of things to do in Vegas on a holiday weekend, but when one of them is a big UFC show? A decent percentage of combat sports & sports entertainment fans are going to pick mixed martial arts over pro wrestling.
While WWE is never going to admit that the move was because of lackluster gate estimates or Brock Lesnar & Ronda Rousey’s old employer, plenty of people will make that connection. One of them was AEW founder/owner/booker Tony Khan. TK’s in Vegas for a week of shows culminating in Sunday’s Double or Nothing PPV, and he used a dinner meeting he had with UFC president Dana White as a segue to a shot at the Money in the Bank move. And of course promote Rampage tonight!
Genius move trying to take on Dana and the UFC in Vegas during International Fight Week.
— Tony Khan (@TonyKhan) May 27, 2022
See you tonight on Friday Night #AEWRampage on @tntdrama at a special time tonight
6:30pm ET/5:30pm CT/4:30pm MT/3:30pm PT!
Not what Team WWE wants to hear, but not at all surprising from a man who once said, “I think there’s only room for one Khan in the wrestling business, Nick, and it’s me, it’s Tony Khan. It’s not some conman from Connecticut.”
Thoughts?
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