Ring of Honor Out of Madison Square Garden Debut Due To WWE

The house that the WWE runs? Madison Square Garden is one of the hallowed grounds of wrestling. The WWE and its predecessors have run wrestling cards there for nearly a year with several WrestleManias taking place in the venue. It’s been over thirty years since another wrestling promotion has run a show there and at the moment, WWE seems intent on keeping that streak alive for a long time to come.

According to PWInsider.com by way of 411mania.com, Ring of Honor COO Joe Koff has said that the company had a date scheduled for Madison Square Garden in 2019 but things fell through due to some unspecified intervention from WWE. At the moment, AAA has booked several dates in Madison Square Garden for the fall of 2018. There is no word or indication that WWE may intervene and have those dates canceled as well. There is also no word on WWE putting on a show in the arena.

Here are Koff’s comments:

“You know, I’m going to tell you Mike because you are asking. I’m not going to discuss beyond this statement because I am not going to litigate this in the press. We had a deal with [Madison Square] Garden and they then told us they were backing out after communications from the WWE. We are not able to get any other dates in any kind of discussion. I’m expecting that our lawyers will be contacting all the parties involved and the best we can hope is that we can find a resolution, so we can bring the kind of energy and excitement that ROH and our partner New Japan to a bigger audience and to bigger arenas and to the fans of New York City.”

When asked about another date being secured, Koff said “there is no date and the discussion is going to end there on that.”

Here’s one of the more famous Garden moments.

Roddy Piper makes his entrance at WrestleMania I

Opinion: I mean….really? I know WWE is protective of their territory, but does it really matter that much if a company miles beneath you is running a single arena? There’s nothing stopping them from running another place in the same city, but that one arena is all that matters? WWE does come off more as a bully here than anything else, but it’s not like Ring of Honor can really do anything about it. The fans that are going to come to the show are going to come no matter what, and that’s a positive for the company.

What do you think of WWE’s actions? Does this hurt Ring of Honor? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 50,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 5,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his Amazon author page with 27 wrestling books. His latest book is the NXT: The Full Sail Years Volume III: From Dallas To New Orleans.

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