Select Answers: More on WWE departures and contracts

Welcome to Select Answers, a short feature that provides some of the answers to questions that were posed to Sean Ross Sapp in the most recent Fightful Weekly Q&A Podcast. The show drops every week on Fightful Select for subscribers.

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I was listening to Dave last night, and every time he talked about a released talent, he would say TNA. If that’s the case, instead of releasing the talent, why wouldn’t they just send them to TNA?

For a lot of reasons. The main one being that WWE would still be on the hook for salary. Naturally, you're going to make more on a WWE salary than a TNA salary. They're also on the hook for any injuries that would occur in a TNA ring if they're still contracted by WWE as a result of their exclusivity. I could see a situation in the future where WWE asks TNA or AAA if they want to take on the salary and contract, but that would have to be worked into the original independent contractor agreement.

How much would you say a low to mid card wrestler makes a year? I know it sucks being cut, but maybe it is best off so they can work more elsewhere. I hope for the best for them all

The claim from those that I spoke to was that the minimum WWE main roster salary is $350,000 per year now. We reported that back in February, but I'm sure that will get aggregated again! Elsewhere, it depends. There were top champions in TNA four years ago at $50,000 a year, which went up. Now it's based more on date. AEW is harder to nail down.

With the recent unfortunate releases i was wondering why the nxt talent only has to wait 30 days and the main roster talent has to wait 90 days?

That's just the way those contracts are drawn up. When you move to the main roster, you almost always get a new contract, and then they switch it to 90 days. There was an exception, as they forgot to do so with Aleister Black when WWE first released him. They called a number of talent in a panic trying to make sure they were all on 90 days.