Dave Bautista Also Doesn't Think WWE Will Ever Unionize

TMZ caught up with Dave Bautista, a former WWE champion and now a comic book movie star, at the airport. Most of the conversation centered around Bautista’s belief that his friend Titus O’Neil got boned by Vince McMahon in getting suspended past WrestleMania for slight physical contact after Daniel Bryan’s retirement. At the time, Bautista tweeted that O’Neil should leave WWE.

The tidbit that stuck out most to me was that Bautista answered a question about the possibility of WWE unionization by saying “It’ll never happen … Wrestlers are too expendable. Professional wrestlers, we’re not even real employees, we’re independent contractors.”

The latter point is precisely why unionization would be a palatable option for the performers, if they were willing and able to organize for their greater good.

In 2014, I asked Steve Austin about the idea. He answered:

"The word “union” came up many times in my career, but the deal is that top guys get taken such good care of and middle guys are okay. Guys at the bottom, you know, are the guys at the bottom. So, you’re never gonna get true unity because the guys on top are making too much money to side with everyone else and forego their well-being. The thought of a union is intriguing. But, will it ever happen? I think not."

I followed up on Austin’s point with Jim Ross last year. His response:

"I heard years and years ago that Jesse Ventura was interested in helping to form a wrestlers’ union, but for whatever reason it didn’t materialize. I don’t think the wrestlers will ever have a union. As an entity, they would need a lot of outside counsel and organizers. I don’t know that any of them have the background or expertise to form a union. Then you start getting into the dues, and who among your peers is going to be in charge of things. I could see an overall lack of trust in that regard. I think Steve’s got a very good point. The guys that fight their way up to the top of the ladder and fight their way to main event status can make a tremendous amount of money — 7-8 figures a year for many years if they perform well and are durable. This is no different from the NFL on pay scale. There are levels, and WWE’s budget is akin to a salary cap. Even the lower end guys are not earning a bad living — they’re more disgruntled about their roles and the ways they’re cast than they are about the cash that they’re making."

JR continued:

"I asked my original boss Bill Watts if he was ever worried as a promoter that the wrestlers of the 25-30 territories would form a union, and he had a belly laugh. “They can’t even agree on what they’ll have for lunch,” he said. Every year, somebody writes or talks about unions in wrestling because they’re so prevalent in other sports. Some of those work pretty good, and some of them aren’t. You can’t tell me that they’re all equal. They’d have to have an effective union for it to make any difference, and money would have to come out of their pocket and have trust in the process before there were any returns. If they’re smart with their money, a majority of the WWE guys will end up very well off at the end of their careers. It’s like Herm Edwards would say. You need one car. One watch. One gold chain. One house. One baby’s mama. One. Pro wrestlers are no different. Some of the guys from the 80’s weren’t prepared for the money they were gonna earn, and spent it like it was never gonna go away. Today, some of them are struggling mightily. They made enough to invest and save…"

Returning to Bautista’s point, the rank and file are certainly expendable, and there are any number of able bodies in NXT and the rest of the world chomping at the bit to take their place. There are about 10 or so stars that can WWE could afford to lose on a one-by-one basis, but would crumble if they all showed solidarity.

But, they don’t have anywhere else to go to make a comparable living, and as Austin and JR said the ones at the top are treated pretty well financially, and lack the collective incentive to band together on behalf of those beneath them on the ladder.

In all likelihood, a WWE union won’t happen anytime soon, but the way it would come to fruition is if the top talent were united behind the principle of the cause.