ROH to run MSG next year

[lanza218]

Dunzo

Ring Of Honor has lost their date for Madison Square Garden. Last week, Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter reported that WWE was doing everything to block ROH from running there. The belief was that ROH would have run on the night before WrestleMania in New York City.

ROH COO Joe Koff confirmed today to PWInsider that there was a deal with Madison Square Garden but the venue said that they were backing out after communications with WWE. Koff noted that lawyers would be getting involved and hopefully, a resolution could be reached “so we can bring the kind of energy and excitement that ROH and our partner New Japan to a bigger audience and to bigger arenas and to the fans of New York City.”

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As previously noted here, MSG has been more open to allowing more wrestling promotions to run in their venue because WWE does not run there as much as they used to. WCW tried to run there in the 90’s but were shut out because WWE had a lock on the venue.

At this point, there’s no word on what MSG is getting in return from WWE in exchange for canceling ROH’s date. All of the ancillary WrestleMania weekend events next year will be taking place at the Barclays Center.

AAA has a date tentatively booked for September but my guess is that the show will not take place there.

[WOODMO]

They never intended to actually run. They knew WWE would do this, and thus granting them exposure and more legitimacy in fans minds if they "were going to run the Garden!"

If WWE would have called their bluff and done nothing, this would never happen anyway.

[AJLe]

They never intended to actually run. They knew WWE would do this, and thus granting them exposure and more legitimacy in fans minds if they "were going to run the Garden!"

If WWE would have called their bluff and done nothing, this would never happen anyway.

This - times a million.

If they had a legitimate date secured that they actually planned on running, they would have announced the actual date with a ticket onsale, and all of the other specific info. Instead, they have a super-vague announcement with zero specifics, then claim it was blocked a week later.

This was nothing more than a publicity thing, to pander to the anti-WWE smarks, and to paint a narrative putting themselves as the underdogs against the big, bad WWE evil empire.

Very carny.

[Greg2600]

And why I never gave a toot about this!

[mrira]

Garden is more then likely out of reach to any wrestling promotor not named McMahon or Levesque. I could see ROH running Nassau Coliseum, they could certainly sell it out with a strong NJPW presence.

[lanza218]

False. Hence why All In is such a big deal

[WOODMO]

ROH wouldn't run Nassau. They do well with the NYC hub, Long Island would scare a decent amount of people off.

[AJLe]

ROH wouldn't run Nassau. They do well with the NYC hub, Long Island would scare a decent amount of people off.

Very true. I'm a wrestling fan who's attended a gazillion shows in the NY/NJ area. I've been to COUNTLESS Shows at MSG, the Meadowlands, Hammerstein, the ECW Arena, etc. I've been to the Nassau Coliseum...twice.

If you don't live on LI, it's a total pain in the ass traffic-wise to get to the Coliseum. Unless they got just a ridiculously cheap sweetheart deal to run there, it would be be stupid for any indy group to run Nassau. Too many better and more convenient options elsewhere in the area.

[class316]

I'm still confused how WWE has any clout for MSG considering they didn't run in MSG in how long?

[WOODMO]

I'm still confused how WWE has any clout for MSG considering they didn't run in MSG in how long?

They run a house show yearly.

[class316]

They run a house show yearly.

So one house show a year gives them this power?

[WOODMO]

They run a house show yearly.

So one house show a year gives them this power?

What power? To pick them over someone who would run there once, fail miserably and never come back? Yeah

[lanza218]

It's in the contract

[mrira]

They run like 3 a year from MSG; road to Wrestlemania, road to Summerslam & after Christmas. Guess either WWE doesn’t care about keeping MSG exclusively to them or ROH won a suit. Can’t see this card not selling out

[AJLe]

No way anybody filed and won any lawsuit that quickly - the whole "WWE blocked us" story was likely a bullshit story to play up to the anti-WWE fans. I'm sure that if the show falls through, or has any issues whatsoever, they'll still have "WWE sabotaged us" as a fallback excuse.