TKO exec: WWE Wrestlepalooza could be another WrestleMania or SummerSlam for us
TKO chief operating officer Mark Shapiro is putting a lot of stock into this month’s WWE WrestlePalooza.
Shapiro spoke at the annual Goldman Sachs Communacopia & Technology Conference Wednesday where he talked about the September 20 premium live event that will kick off their multi-year deal with ESPN. Audio from the talk can be found below.
He said they hope Wrestlepalooza is “an annual recurring franchise” for the company and one that is both is on par with two of their most notable annual PLEs and becomes part of their big four events of the WWE year.
“Hopefully, Wrestlepalooza is a winner and we can bring that back annually. That could be a marketing bonanza for us if we do that right,” he said, adding that Paul “Triple H” Levesque is spending day and night creatively making “what we think it can be: another WrestleMania or another SummerSlam.”
He said the Royal Rumble is just below that level and they feel Wrestlepalooza could be in that quadrant.
The Saturday show from Indianapolis, Indiana, will be the first PLE on the new ESPN streaming service and will run partially head-to-head with the AEW All Out pay-per-view.
Since 2011, Josh has been a contributing editor to Wrestling Observer/F4WOnline.com and also hosts the Punch-Out podcast. He has also written for Fight Magazine, Bloody Elbow, Bleacher Report, and other websites. He's a 2000 graduate of the University of Maine, worked in pro sports, and once was an indie ring announcer.