WWE: Mark Shapiro on Not Regretting Moving WrestleMania 42 To Las Vegas, Chris Jericho on Rumors of Him Having Talks with WWE for Potential Return, Charlotte Flair, Trick Williams, The Usos, & More Advertised for UFC Freedom 250 Fan Fest Event

May 19, 2026

Mark Shapiro Comments on Not Regretting Moving WrestleMania 42 To Las Vegas

Yahoo Finance held a recent interview with TKO COO and President Mark Shapiro. One of the topics discussed included Shapiro’s thoughts about him not regretting the decision to move WrestleMania 42 from New Orleans to Las Vegas. This interview was held prior to this past April’s WrestleMania 42 event.

“WWE, UFC, PBR — in today’s economic climate and obviously a lot going on from a geopolitical perspective and a lot going on at home from an affordability perspective, we’re still seeing massive uptick —maybe even more so — of families and fans that want to come out and escape the day-to-day. They’re doing it through the lens of our sports and entertainment properties. We’re seeing strong growth on our ticket yields, we’re seeing sellouts across the board on our UFC numbered events and our Raw, SmackDown, NXT, and Premium Live Events at WWE. PBR is having its best year in the last 5 years. That should tell you something in terms of demand, anticipation, and following and should bode well for years of long-term sustained growth. I would tell you that Vegas is 2 years in a row for WrestleMania 42, so some of the challenges we had there is usually we move WrestleMania year after year to a new spot and that allows us to obviously grow and see the kind of economic impact we would expect. Maybe it’s a mistake I made because Vegas was so huge last year and such a winner for our fans and the product that I said to Nick Khan, ‘We’ve gotta go back to Vegas next year. We have to move New Orleans down the road and we got to come back to Vegas.’ Las Vegas, I don’t need to tell you, is the Mecca for great events. More and more events are moving there, music has residences, and more and more sports teams — as evidenced by the NHL and soon-to-be Major League Baseball — are popping up there with teams to come. Absolutely no regrets on going back there, but the only reason you’re hearing some of the, hey it’s not what it was last year, it’s because we’re not benefiting from the first mover experience.”

Transcript h/t: Fightful.com

Chris Jericho Comments on Rumors of Him Having Talks with WWE for Potential Return

As noted before, Chris Jericho had signed a new contract with AEW earlier this year to remain in teh company for the foreseeable future. Prior to his return to AEW this past April, Jericho had been rumored for several months to be potentially returning to WWE.

A recent episode of The Ringer’s The Mask Man Show podcast featured Jericho as the guest. One of the topics discussed included Jericho’s thoughts about the reports and rumors of him possibly having talks with WWE during his free agency period for a potential return to the company.

“The interesting thing about fans — going back to what we said earlier about having a career where you can watch anything online — is that fans in this day and age, they form their own opinions and then it becomes law because the opinions spread. Whatever people believed or didn’t believe, I was not ever a part of any of it. I think the best part was there was so much speculation of what is he going to do that either way, with the tribalism of wrestling nowadays, there’d be people happy about it and not happy about it. This is the worst thing ever and this is the best thing ever. I’ve never really focused on that side of like, this is terrible and it’s never going to work. To me, anything can work and you always want to do your best to make it work. I focus on the people who are excited about things and the people who want to be entertained and want to be happy and want to have fun. That’s kind of the crowd that I focus on.”

Jericho also clarified his comments stating that he will leave that for another day.

“I’ll leave that for another day. I like the idea of the intrigue.”

Transcript h/t: Fightful.com

Charlotte Flair, Trick Williams, The Usos, & More Advertised for UFC Freedom 250 Fan Fest Event

As noted before, UFC recently announced that several WWE talents will be making an appearance at their UFC Freedom 250 Fan Fest event on June 13-14 in Washington, D.C.

During Monday’s WWE RAW show in Greensboro, North Carolina, WWE announced that Charlotte Flair, The Miz, Chelsea Green, WWE United States Champion Trick Williams, The Usos (Jimmy & Jey Uso), Bron Breakker, and WWE Women’s United States Champion Tiffany Stratton will be making an apeparance at UFC’s upcoming fan fest event.