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AEW seeks to move Kelly & Tate case to federal court, paid talents over $60 million since 2022

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A quick tl;dr from Thedinosaurwizard on Reddit:

A quick summary from someone who is not at all qualified to weigh in on this stuff for people who don't want to click through so if I'm wrong please just straight up call me out:

The lawsuit filed by Stephen P. New for the Tate brothers (Boys, of Dalton Castle & The fame) and Kevin Kelly was filed in a district court in Philly. AEW's legal team responded by saying that, actually, this belongs in Federal court, because it meets the Three Rules for what I'm going to refer to as a "Super Lawsuit", those being that it involves people from states other than Pennsylvania where it was filed, that it involves more than 100 people, and that it involves more than $5 million.

The lawsuit primarily revolves around The Boys being improperly listed as independent contractors when, New argues, they weren't. So my untrained, semi-literate understanding is that AEW's saying, essentially, "Okay but if you're right then that applies to all these people too, here's proof that it does, please by all means keep going and argue for them too, but you gotta do that in the WrestleMania of courts, not just this podunk city of Philly", which is some excellent cheap heat in my opinion.

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[Smackdown Spoilers] PWInsider confirmation on the coming soon vignette

https://pwinsider.com/article/188663/coming-soon-vignette-on-wwe-appears-to-be-for.html?p=1

"A coming soon vignette on Friday Night Smackdown aired, featuring footage that appeared to be from Detroit. We are told that the vignette would be for The Motor City Machine Guns. Originally, there was a plan for the team to debut in WWE NXT for a short run there before moving on, but they were not in Chicago as originally expected earlier this week. Instead, it appears they are Smackdown bound." Coincidentally, the Brazilian (I believe) announce team on SmackDown fucked up and spoiled who it was live during the broadcast.

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AEW seeks to move Kelly & Tate case to federal court, paid talents over $60 million since 2022

www.postwrestling.com

Defendants in the class action complaint filed by Kevin Kelly and Brandon & Brent Tate are seeking to move the case to federal court, citing multiple factors and outlining AEW’s payment to talent and wrestlers, according to new federal court filings. In late August, Kevin Kelly (Kevin Foote), and the Tates filed a class action complaint in the Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia against All Elite Wrestling, Tony Khan, and Ian Riccaboni. The plaintiffs argue that AEW has misclassified its wrestlers and talent as independent contractors while also alleging wrongful termination for the Tate brothers, and defamation committed against Foote over a comment made by Riccaboni on a Discord channel regarding Foote’s promotion of The Sound of Freedom film. The plaintiffs filed the complaint on September 6 and the defendants responded on Friday with a request to move the case to the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The plaintiffs plan to respond by requesting the case be returned to the Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia. “We plan to move to remand,” the plaintiffs’ attorney Stephen New told POST Wrestling and Wrestlenomics when reached for comment on Friday. Attorneys for AEW, Khan, and Riccaboni argue that the case meets multiple thresholds under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA), which applies “to any class action before or after the entry of a class certification order by the court with respect to that action.” Factors to qualify under CAFA include federal jurisdiction for class actions where the amount in controversy exceeds $5 million in the aggregate for the entire class and putative class, containing at least 100 members, and that any member of the putative class is a citizen of a state different than that of the defendant(s). The misclassification issue is divided into two classes: “all current and former Talent”, presumably covering non-wrestler talent, and secondly, “all current and former Wrestlers”, covering wrestlers. The classes would cover all talent and wrestlers who worked for AEW from September 1, 2022, to the present. In a declaration from AEW’s Senior Vice President of Business Strategy, Chris Harrington writes that between the dates in question, 290 individuals provided services for AEW as wrestlers or non-wrestling talent under independent contractor agreements and paid those members “more than $60,000,000 in the aggregate,” providing rare insight into AEW’s talent compensation. The figure would work out to roughly $207,000 paid to each wrestler and talent over the two-year period, although that’s an average, and there’s likely disparity in compensation across talent and wrestlers. Disclosure: Brandon Thurston operates and solely owns Wrestlenomics LLC. Chris Harrington originally started using the Wrestlenomics name in 2013 and he and Thurston co-hosted the Wrestlenomics Radio podcast together from 2017 to 2018. Harrington has no ownership or role in Wrestlenomics today. Harrington adds that ten members of the class hold residency in the state of Pennsylvania, which equals 3.4% of the class. Defendants Brandon & Brent Tate are residents of Tennessee. Ian Riccaboni is a resident of Pennsylvania. Adding to the diversity in jurisdiction issue, AEW is a registered corporation in both Delaware & Florida. If AEW were to reclassify those members as employees, Harrington writes in the declaration, the company would incur a tax liability of “at least 9.95% of the pay rendered to Putative Class Members, meaning more than $5,970,000 in the aggregate.” As well, AEW would “incur costs in connection with employee benefits of approximately $18,125 annually per employee, meaning $5,256,250 per year in the aggregate.” Along with an estimated 30% allocated for attorney fees, AEW lists an estimate of $14,594,125 in expenses associated and greatly exceeding CAFA’s minimum threshold of $5 million. POST Wrestling and Wrestlenomics reached out to AEW’s attorneys and public relations representatives for comment and will update this report if they respond.

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AEW Collision Discussion Thread - 10/05/24 (Spoilers)

Tonight, **AEW Collision** comes to us from Toledo, Ohio! The card for tonight's show will be: **Singles Match** Johnny TV vs. Darby Allin **Tag Team Match** Grizzled Young Veterans (James Drake & Zack Gibson) vs. The Outrunners (Truth Magnum & Turbo Floyd) **Singles Match** Willow Nightingale vs. Trish Adora **Singles Match** Wheeler Yuta vs. BEEF (w/Anthony Henry) **Tag Team Match** The Premier Athletes (Ariya Daivari & Tony Nese) vs. The Conglomeration (Kyle O'Reilly & Orange Cassidy) **Four Way Match** Hologram vs. Komander vs. Nick Wayne vs. Action Andretti **Singles Match** Zoey Lynn vs. Kris Statlander **AEW World Tag Team Title #1 Contendership Eliminator Match** Top Flight (Dante Martin & Darius Martin) vs. Private Party (Isiah Kassidy & Marq Quen) vs. House Of Black (Buddy Matthews & Malakai Black) *And more!* Please check your local listings and AllEliteWrestling.com for more information on how to watch. Card subject to change, enjoy your show!

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WWE Bad Blood 2024 Discussion Thread (Spoilers)

Tonight, **WWE** brings us **Bad Blood**, live from the State Farm Arena in Atlanta, Georgia! The card for tonight's show will be: **WWE Women's World Title Match (w/ Dominik locked in a shark cage)** Liv Morgan (c) vs. Rhea Ripley **Hell In A Cell Match** CM Punk vs. Drew McIntyre **WWE Women's Title Match** Nia Jax (c) vs. Bayley **Singles Match** Finn Balor vs. Damian Priest **Tag Team Match** Cody Rhodes & Roman Reigns vs. The Bloodline (Jacob Fatu & Solo Sikoa) *And more!* Please check your local listings for more information on how to watch. Card subject to change, enjoy your show!

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