Last night, the WWE Royal Rumble took place from Tropicana Field in Tampa, Florida. The tentpole premium live event was capped off by Cody Rhodes winning the big match for the second year in a row. It was a satisfying end to the show but, sadly, was tough to enjoy for many due to the black cloud hanging over the promotion. Only a few days prior to the show, a bombshell report was released detailing allegations by former WWE employee Janel Grant toward Vince McMahon. In her sixty-seven-page lawsuit, Grant graphicly details the process in which McMahon groomed her before trafficking her out to WWE executives and talent.
During the post-show press conference, Jon Alba, representing Fightful, asked WWE Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple” H what his awareness of the allegations against McMahon was when he voted to have him removed from the Board of Directors about a year ago.
“Yeah,” he began. “So, I’m gonna do exactly what you would expect me to do here. Look, we just had an amazing week. I just said a ten-year $5 billion Netflix deal. The Rock joining our board. We just sold out the Royal Rumble and put 48,000 people in the Tropicana Field. I choose to focus on the positive. And yes, there’s a negative, but I want to focus on that and just keep it to that.”
Following Levesque’s response, Cameron Hawkins of The Ringer asked a follow-up to a question I posed to Rhodes earlier in the press conference. I asked Rhodes what changes he thought should be made in the industry to prevent a situation like this from happening again. Hawkins pressed Levesque on what efforts WWE is making to ensure everyone who works for the company feels safe and will not be taken advantage of by people in power.
“I’ll give you the most generalized answer that I can: everything possible,” Levesque flatly stated. “Yeah, it’s, a, that, that is a very important thing to us; very important topic to us. It’s as simple as everything possible.”
At a time when the industry is looking for change, answers, and leadership, it would have been refreshing to have Levesque give specific examples of what is being done to address the horrific allegations Grant brings to light in her suit.
Wrestlenomics‘ Brandon Thurston delivered the last question to Levesque regarding Grant’s allegations against McMahon. Thurston simply wanted to know if Levesque had taken the time to read Grant’s suit and understand the gravity of the allegations.
“I did not,” Levesque responded. “I think Cody mentioned that we all found out in real-time when you were, and that’s the truth. I’ll go back to what I said before: this is an amazing week for us. And I just, at this point, I don’t even want to get bogged down in the negatives of it. I just want to focus on the positives and where we’re going and we’re at the most exciting time of the year for us.
“We’re at the most exciting point, to me, business-wise, I think that we’ve ever had. I think Cody might have said the the; I don’t exactly remember how he said it, but the best positioning of this company since The Attitude Era. I’ve been through that era. I understand what it’s like, I feel like we are in the middle of something that while we might not be able to put our finger on it right now.
“Five to ten years from now, we’re going to be saying like, ‘Wow, what a time that was.’ I want to I want to focus on that.”
If you use any quotes from this article, please give a h/t to Haus of Wrestling