There appears to be some light shed on the contracts that were offered to The Young Bucks and Hangman Page from WWE.
Triple H was reportedly the man behind the deals with The Elite members, according to Dave Meltzer in the latest edition of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
Meltzer states that Page's deal was to work NXT for main roster money. The plan was to push the former ROH star as one of the top talents in the developmental brand.
For the Young Bucks, the company had a three-year deal set, which would have been for the same amount of money as Smackdown star, AJ Styles.
The WWE deal included having their Being The Elite show airing weekly on the WWE Network. There was also an interesting stipulation where if the Bucks weren’t happy with their position in the company after six months, then WWE would have allowed them out of their contracts.
The belief in WWE was that the offer was so good that there was no way it would be turned down. The company was so confident of getting them that they had already come up with a “significant storyline” for their debut at the Royal Rumble, leading into WrestleMania.
The reasoning behind WWE going so hard after the group because they were well aware that Tony Khan would not be able to go ahead with AEW – which they knew about months ago – without the Bucks and Cody, as the key players from All In would no longer be involved. Long story short, WWE was trying to prevent AEW from happening.
As noted, Kenny Omega's contract with New Japan Pro Wrestling expires at the end of this month and he is expected to sign with AEW after February 1st, when he is a free agent. It was reported in The Observer that the word is that Omega has already turned down WWE's offer.