[外電] WWE moves event out of Denver
Source: http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/playoffs/2009/news/story?id=4188189
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WWE moves event out of Denver
Updated: May 20, 2009, 10:14 PM ET
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Vince McMahon claims he's being thrown out. His opponent insists McMahon is
the double-crosser.
It'd make a good story line for a wrestling feud -- but it won't take place
in Denver.
World Wrestling Entertainment is moving its Monday night show to Los Angeles
because of a conflict with the Pepsi Center in Denver, which had booked two
events for the same night.
The Nuggets are scheduled to host the Lakers on Monday in Game 4 of the
Western Conference finals, but WWE had previously secured the arena for an
episode of Monday Night Raw.
The WWE chairman criticized Kroenke Sports, which owns the Nuggets and Pepsi
Center, for not being more helpful when the conflict arose over the weekend.
"They bumped us right out of the building, hardly an apology," McMahon said
Wednesday. "They didn't do anything for us at all, and the media was talking
about someone has to write a check. They didn't want to write anything and
they wanted to give us a Sunday night. And the name of the show is Monday
Night Raw."
However, Kroenke Sports claims McMahon had previously agreed to a deal to
shift the event to Sunday.
"We negotiated in good faith with Vince and believed we had a deal in
principal as of Tuesday," Kroenke Sports executive vice president Paul
Andrews said. "In fact, it was so clear to us that we did that we asked Vince
to do a joint press release. He said, 'Paul, I have no problem with a joint
press release.' Then, he asked us if he could get five tickets to the Denver
Nuggets' game on Monday night so he could apologize to Mr. Kroenke [Nuggets
owner Stan] in person.
"That was Tuesday. We find out by a press announcement today by Vince, who I
believe is the master of propaganda, that he's moving the event to the
Staples Center. He didn't even contact us to tell us he hadn't accepted the
deal we negotiated the night before, so we're quite shocked, frankly."
WWE executive vice president Shane McMahon, at a press conference at Staples
Center, said the Kroenke offer came too late.
"They tried to be amicable but we're really at such a loss of words because
we were expecting a capacity crowd. Had sold 11,000 as of last week," he
said. "We've been on sale since August so everyone knew we were coming. We
built everything around it. That's what we do. We promote and build the
event."
Vince McMahon said Staples Center called and offered use of its building and
that his organization will return to Denver for an event at the Coliseum on
Aug. 7. McMahon said many arenas, including Madison Square Garden, called and
offered to host Raw. He chose Staples Center, which also was available
Tuesday night for its second night of programming.
McMahon said it was important to have Raw be shown live on its normal Monday
night slot on USA Network -- where it will go head-to-head against the
Nuggets-Lakers game on ESPN. He previously vowed he would hold the event in a
parking lot if need be.
McMahon added the Monday show would include a 5-on-5 match pitting "Lakers"
against "Nuggets" and his character would likely confront a character of
Kroenke, who owns Kroenke Enterprises, in the ring.
But while he said that's entertainment for the fans, he remains angry at
Kroenke and the terms he said were requested in the press release to complete
an agreement.
"They would not even talk about making a deal other than paying our expenses
basically unless we signed some sort of joint press release," McMahon said.
"You would not believe what these people were attempting to make us do. I
guess maybe running over us and throwing us out unceremoniously on our ear
was not good enough. They want to trample us."
WWE said it secured the Pepsi Center last Aug. 15 and had already sold more
than 10,000 tickets for the event. The organization said arena officials
confirmed the wrestlers were still coming and sent a signed contract on April
15, the last night of the regular season.
Then the double booking was set Sunday, when the Lakers beat Houston in Game
7 to reach the conference finals. Had the Lakers lost, Denver would have had
home-court advantage against the Rockets, making the Pepsi Center available
for wrestling on Monday.
The conflict has provided some great press for WWE, but McMahon said his
preference was to do his show as planned.
"I didn't want this publicity," he said. "They threw me out and so what are
we going to do? We have to garner some degree of publicity."
Kroenke Sports said WWE preferred the publicity to a compromise.
"They haven't returned any of our calls for over a 24-hour period since we
had what we believed to be an agreement Tuesday night," Andrews said. "We've
reached out to them all day for feedback and then we get an announcement
they're going to L.A.
"The sensationalism and media attention were more important than the fans of
Denver."
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