With the news all WWE pay-per-view (PPV) events will feature stars from Raw and SmackDown again after WrestleMania 34, the concept of a “Big” show - not to be confused with a “Big Show” - is now more dependent on whether the company books the same city/venue for the nights before and after Sunday night.
Even before the dual-brand PPV story came out, word already was the existing “Big 4” of Royal Rumble, ‘Mania, SummerSlam and Survivor Series would become a “Big 5” in 2018, with June’s Money in the Bank joining the list. We still don’t know if WWE is sticking around Chicago for Monday and Tuesday tapings after MitB this year, but an announcement from Triple H confirms NXT will be in the house the night before the PPV.
.@WWENXT is going to TAKE OVER Chicago, IL on Saturday, June 16th...the night before #MITB.
— Triple H (@TripleH) March 5, 2018
Tickets go on sale 12pm on Saturday, April 14th...BUT:
Combo tickets for #MITB and #NXTTakeOver are available THIS Wednesday at 12pm CT in a special pre-sale on @Ticketmaster. pic.twitter.com/Wq8nEED9mc
This also seems to set NXT’s live special schedule as five per year, with this being the second straight year they’re running Chicago before the PPV. In 2017, Tommaso Ciampa attacked Johnny Gargano after their loss in the final match of the night, kicking of the angle both men are still working on the black-and-yellow brand.
As Trips explains, tickets for this year’s show won’t be on sale until after WrestleMania, but if you’ve got deep pockets and want to spend all weekend with WWE, you can buy your way into Takeover and MitB on Wednesday of this week (Mar. 7).