Summary

Bryan Alvarez shared more reported context this week on why TKO has been pushing some WWE talent to revisit older contracts.

The latest discussion came after Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods left WWE on May 2. Alvarez had previously said both men were asked to restructure their deals before the departures were finalized.

Speaking about the broader situation, Alvarez said the reported focus is not on WWE's top main event names or lower-card wrestlers. Instead, he described a middle group of established talent who signed lucrative deals years ago and are now being evaluated under a different business model.

Quote from Bryan Alvarez

Alvarez said during a recent discussion:

"These people who have been asked to restructure their deals are people who are upper midcard-ish, maybe even higher than that. And the ones I've heard, you know, they've been around for a long time, and they were making a lot of money.

"And we're not talking a guy like Roman Reigns or a guy like Seth Rollins. You know, those guys, the very tippy-top main eventers, they're not going to be asking those tippy-top main eventers to restructure their deals.

"If you are low on the card, you're probably not making enough that they're going to bother. So the reason that there's a specific window, it appears, of people that are being asked to restructure is because, you know, these people signed pretty big money deals quite a while ago, and they've been making that money for quite a while. And, you know, now they're not where they were."

Alvarez later went on to say:

"Their justification is, things are very different now than when you signed this deal. Like, yes, we are asking you to take less money, but their argument is, you are doing significantly less now. You're not doing four house shows a week. You're not on the road four days a week paying for your transportation and your hotel and your this and your that. You're on the road one day a week. You're wrestling maybe twice a month. And, you know, this is, we want to pay you less because you're doing less now. That is their mindset."

TKO's WWE logic and what it could change

If Alvarez's description is accurate, WWE's contract pressure point is landing on veterans in the middle of the roster rather than the names at either end of the pay scale. That puts the Kingston and Woods situation in a bigger company-wide context instead of leaving it as an isolated exit.

It also suggests TKO is judging some older WWE deals against a schedule that no longer looks the same. If that approach continues, other established talent with long-running contracts could be forced into the same choice Kingston and Woods reportedly faced: accept new terms or leave.

Sources

As reported by NoDQ.