It’s only been about a little over a year since we saw the return of the brand split on WWE. It was a complete split that saw superstars drafted exclusively to either Raw or Smackdown. WWE tried to shift both of their rosters again after Wrestlemania this year with an event similar to the Draft, called the Superstar Shakeup. Some fans have been hesitant to attend shows where there favorite stars are not included on the roster, while others have claimed that the brand split has hurt the company since its return. While that also included brand-exclusive pay-per-views and live events at first, it appears that the latter may not be an issue any longer.
Cageside Seats has reported that WWE may be looking to end the brand split aspect of the company as far as the live events are concerned. We have recently heard about stars such as Seth Rollins and Brock Lesnar working WWE live events recently for the opposite brand that they were assigned. It looks like WWE will either be allowing most of their top stars to appear on both brands now, or they will be stopping the brand split entirely on their live events. This will definitely help improve ticket sales for their live events if fans know that top superstars from both brands will be appearing on either of the live events. No word on if WWE is considering abandoning the brand split altogether on TV as well, but that is not expected to be the case.
Cageside Seats is also reporting on another bit of news that concerns the upcoming Mae Young Classic tournament. AdWeek recently honored Stephanie McMahon as one of the Most Powerful Women in Sports. The write-up claimed that Stephanie “also created the first-ever WWE women’s tournament, taking place this summer, with a championship belt every bit as spectacular as the men’s prize.” This had led to some speculation that the winner of the tournament will be receiving a brand new championship title as a reward. The tournament will be concluding with a live finale from Las Vegas on September 12th of this year, but no prize for the winner of the tournament has been announced as of yet.