Donald Trump has agreed to work more Raw shows than had been originally agreed upon. The participants in his match against Vince McMahon, after Hulk Hogan had been cut, were at one point slated to be Bobby Lashley and King Booker. They appear to have changed their minds about Booker but are sticking with Lashley, since he is Vince’s number one project just now. They are reluctant to use Khali because of THE GREAT SUCK but Umaga might wind up being Vince’s pick for the match.
People close to the Vince/Hogan situation say that their falling out was more than just Hogan’s Hall of Fame spoiling appearance on the Bubba the Love Sponge show. It was said to be more to do with money. Hogan felt he was worth more because of gaining a new fan base via Hogan Knows Best and also wanted a better merchandise push by WWE. He never liked the idea of working with Khali, was disappointed Vince had not been able to get the match with Steve Austin finalised, and had also complained about his SummerSlam pay-off from last year. The decision to cut him from WrestleMania was all but made before his radio appearance, which sealed the deal. His excuse – “Well, I was drinking before the show” – did not do him any favours either.
There was further heat on him because Ann Russo-Gordon, John Laurinaitis’ secretary, had a long working relationship with Hogan and the feeling was that he deliberately put her in a horrible position. She feared she would lose her job over the incident but Vince was more angry about Laurinaitis getting her to make the call in the first place rather than doing it himself.
Elsewhere, Brooke Hogan is moving to Los Angeles to, in her mother’s words, become the next Paris Hilton.
WWE’s total PPV buys from May until the end of 2006 were 3,110,000, a drop from 3,618,000 the previous year. The drop in North American buys was a particularly harsh 17%, although there was a domestic price increase of 14%.
December to Dismember was the first PPV the company has done in over a decade to have actually lost money.
WrestleMania XXII has shipped 426,000 DVDs, which is the all-time company record by far.
Credit: Wrestling Observer newsletter (click here for subscription information)
