EL SEGUNDO — And all along, we thought the only wrestling going on the Western Conference Finals would be under the baskets as the Lakers and Nuggets fought for rebounds.
Though Game 1 Tuesday night was rugged, it turned out to be nothing compared to the behind-the-scenes wrestling between WWE chairman Vince McMahon and Kroenke Sports Enterprises over a scheduling conflict at Denver’s Pepsi Center.
Wednesday, the WWE laid the smackdown on the arena … with a little help from an unexpected tag team partner as the Staples Center jumped into the ring.
The arena, owned by Kroenke Sports, had been scheduled to host the WWE Monday Night RAW event, but ran into conflict when the Nuggets advanced to the conference finals and Game 4 was scheduled for the same Monday.
“They bumped us right out of the building, hardly an apology,” McMahon said Wednesday. “They didn’t do anything for us at all, and the media was talking about someone has to write a check. They didn’t want to write anything and they wanted to give us a Sunday night. And the name of the show is Monday
Night Raw.”
Staples Center spokesman Michael Roth said that his group approached the WWE when news of the schedule conflict surfaced.
“WWE has been a good partner for Staples and when we saw they were having a scheduling conflict, we reached out to them,” Roth said. “We were really pleased our schedule allowed us to accomodate WWE and their shows for Monday and Tuesday.”
Tickets for the Staples Center event went on sale at 8 p.m. Wednesday and will be available until they are sold out. Roth said previous WWE shows have done well at the arena.
More than 10,000 tickets had been sold to the now-cancelled Denver event, but fans with tickets can get a refund through Ticketmaster or exchange them for tickets to a new show set for Aug. 7 at the Denver Coliseum.
Not that this story is settled just yet.
The always-bombastic McMahon hinted that there will be a confrontation between himself and an actor posing as Stan Kroenke, owner of the Nuggets and the Pepsi Center.
Kroenke Sports issued a statement Wednesday afternoon that asserted WWE had gone back on a verbal agreement to reschedule the show for Sunday night.
“We had hoped for, and worked hard toward an amicable resolution – which we verbally had on Tuesday,” said KSE Executive Vice President Paul Andrews. “It’s unfortunate and disappointing that WWE executives ultimately chose this path. The sensationalism employed by WWE in this instance is not surprising. The amount of publicity and coverage enjoyed by their group over the last few days has clearly become their new business goal instead of finalizing what we thought was a favorable solution and would have ultimately allowed their fans to attend the event.”