JBL says Vince McMahon made sure that WWE didn't lose their TV contracts.
Years before business was booming as it currently is in WWE, the company faced major challenges when the COVID-19 pandemic turned the wrestling world on its head. Companies held empty arena shows for months, as fans were unable to attend events due to restrictions. WWE adapted and held shows in the ThunderDome before live fans eventually returned in 2021.
Speaking on Something to Wrestle, JBL looked back on the pandemic era and recalled how Vince McMahon asked him to come do commentary.
“During COVID, Vince called me, and he goes, ‘I need an old voice on television.’ I was sitting right here on my couch, and Vince McMahon on the phone comes up. I’m like, you gotta be kidding me [laughs]. Because right there, you have no idea what’s happening with COVID. You think the whole world’s about to end. The phone rang, so I answered, I said, ‘This is the only phone call I would answer.’ He goes, ‘Well, are you coming?’ I go, ‘You know I am.’ He goes, ‘We’re in Orlando, we got no audience. I need an old voice to be on commentary, somebody that people recognize.’ So I said okay, I’ll be there," JBL said.
JBL then noted that McMahon had said that if WWE did not run shows, the company would lose their television contracts. He explained how McMahon made sure that he did not violate the contracts by continuing to run shows. In doing so, JBL said that McMahon saved the company.
“We’re going down there trying to keep the company alive. I can tell you, almost everybody in the company was against Vince running. Everybody was against it. All the press was against it, everything. ‘How dare he do this?’ Now, when I got down there, Vince said, ‘Ah, it’s just nothing but the flu.’ He said, ‘If I don’t, I lose all my TV contracts,’ and it’s what they’re wanting to do because those TV contracts of live events became worth exponentially more. You thought they were going to be worth exponentially less, is what you thought during COVID because we didn’t know if the world was ending or not. Everybody wanted out of those TV contracts. Well, the way Vince wouldn’t violate it was by running shows without a crowd, and because he did that, and I cannot emphasize enough, everybody was against it, because he did that, he got these billion-dollar TV contracts out of it. Man, he saved the freaking company with that. It was unbelievable, what he did by doing all that. Vince his entire life has constantly been one step ahead of everything and everybody else in wrestling," JBL said.
Co-host Conrad Thompson asked JBL whether McMahon was concerned that FOX would have dropped WWE if they could find a way out of the contract. JBL stated that they would have, and he emphasized that McMahon said this himself when he went to Orlando early in the pandemic era.
“They would’ve. He said it straight up. He said it. If they have a chance to get out of these contracts, they’re gonna get out. He told me that when I done there. He said that, almost exactly what you said. ‘They’ll get out of it if they can. I’m not gonna let them. I’m not gonna let them bankrupt my company by getting out of something and using a pandemic as an excuse.’ Not really an excuse, I get that, but he had a chance to run during it, and by doing that, they couldn’t get out of the contracts, and he ended up getting these billion-dollar TV contracts out of it," JBL said.
Vince McMahon resigned from WWE and TKO in January 2024 after Janel Grant filed a lawsuit alleging physical and emotional abuse, sexual assault, and trafficking at WWE. McMahon denied the allegations, but he remains under investigation.
As JBL noted, WWE handed a lucrative deal with Netflix, and WWE Raw will premiere on the streaming service on January 6.
JBL recently teased his plans for 2025. Check out his comments here.
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