Court Bauer Talks MJF Working For AEW And MLW, Vince McMahon Micromanaging WWE Creative
With AEW gearing up for its TNT debut this fall, they likely want all of their talent on board for their television debut. That presents a problem as MJF is signed with both AEW and MLW and he holds tag team gold with the latter.
The Montreal Screwjob resulted from one side being afraid of its current champion showing up in another promotion with a belt, but there don't appear to be those same concerns in regards to this situation. MLW founder Court Bauer talked more about it when he spoke to Wrestling Inc. on our WINCLY podcast.
"There's this misnomer that it's like Cinderella at midnight and things are gonna automatically change when [AEW] go on TV. That's not the case because we have pre-existing contracts and the guys that are with us are for the duration of those contracts. At that point we'll have a conversation on if we continue to work with them or they go their separate ways," said Bauer.
"But it's not gonna just happen overnight where October X you're gonna be only on that show. They have pre-existing contracts with us."
Bauer was asked about MLW's relationship with AEW and he said he has nothing negative to say about them. Their talks have been great and AEW has been very easy going.
"It's in everyone's best interest to find ways to work things out rather than to flex and be all ego-driven," stated Bauer. "Then it just escalates things and usually it's a negative outcome. I try to approach things more holistically and pragmatically to try and find a solution where everyone can win."
AEW landed Jon Moxley once he became a free agent and Bauer revealed if MLW ever made a play for Mox.
"Love Moxley but we did not have any conversations," stated Bauer who was then asked about Moxley expressing his frustrations with WWE and himself being a former WWE writer.
"I think a lot of people when they go through the system, at a certain point it's like is it working or not? If not then it can be very frustrating. When you're a talent, you want to have that creative freedom and he was passionate about how he was presented?
"At WWE there are guys who advocate and say it's the best place in the world and then you have people say they were liberated in leaving there. That just comes with the territory."
Bauer said WWE was so different when he was there as opposed to how it is now. The creative process, production and infrastructure are vastly different and there are more layers now to get to Vince McMahon.
"I don't know how the creative team could work without direct access and collaborating with [Vince] because he micromanages creative and gives the big picture. If you're presenting a product and the day of the show is the first time you get to have face time with him, I imagine it's probably a challenging proposition," said Bauer. "But again, I'm not there so I don't know."
Bauer was then asked to weigh in on the Sami Callihan-Jim Cornette issue which led to Callihan's exit from MLW.
"There was some stuff that I covered on Twitter but Sami is a very talented wrestler and was an agent for us. He has a lot of passion and I'm fond of him as a wrestler. I know he's gonna be successful wherever he goes next," said Bauer who wished Callihan well but didn't want to delve into the situation.
MLW airs every Saturday night at 9 pm EST via BeIN Sports. Every episode can also be watched for free via MLW's YouTube channel.
Bauer's full interview with Wrestling Inc aired as part of a recent episode of our WINCLY podcast. It can be heard via the embedded audio player at the bottom of this post. In it Bauer discusses MLW and NOAH's new partnership, a possible MLW women's division, MLW's "Moneyball" approach, The Von Erichs joining MLW, Davey Boy Smith's NJPW exit and MLW future, MJF signing with AEW while staying with MLW and more
You can check out past episodes of the WINCLY here. Subscribe to Wrestling Inc. Audio on iTunes or Google Play. Listen to the show via Spotify here or through TuneIn here.