WWE to Step Into Dana White & UFC’s Territory for NXT Battleground

Last year, the world’s two biggest, most valuable combat sports promotions, the WWE and the UFC merged into a single parent company, TKO Holdings. Given the synergy and common ground between the two promotions, the move was an attempt to cut tens of (possibly even a hundred) million in costs for both promotions as well as facilitate cross-promotion among them.

And their first major joint venture is on the horizon. The WWE has announced that it will be holding its 2024 edition of NXT Battleground at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, Nevada. The event was earlier scheduled to be held in May at the Enmarket Arena in Savannah, Georgia.

Yet, according to a report by veteran MMA journalist Aaron Bronsteter, the card has been rescheduled to June 9 at the 130,000-square-foot world-class production and combat sports facility, which hosts UFC Fight Night events and Dana White‘s Contender Series bouts regularly. The only drawback of holding the NXT Battleground event at the Apex is that it has very limited seating. Nevertheless, this may be one of the reasons the WWE has decided to move the event to the Apex, since they may not have gotten the type of response from the audience they expected, and are not expecting much of a crowd for it.

“We are always exploring new frontiers to showcase NXT and we are excited to bring Battleground to this world-class event and production facility in partnership with UFC,” former superstar and WWE Sr. VP of Talent Development Creative Shawn Michaels said in a statement released by the world’s largest pro-wrestling promotion. But, even though NXT Battleground is holding only its second event this year, its history goes back over a decade.

WWE’s ‘Battleground’ event makes a return after a decade

The ‘Battleground’ brand is making a comeback. This year will mark the second edition of the NXT brand’s Battleground event, which the WWE hopes to make an annual event. Battleground started as a full-fledged WWE pay-per-view event associated with the main brand back in October 2013, replacing the ‘Over the Limit’ PPV event.

After the inaugural edition, the event would take place in July for the next five years. Until 2018, when the Vince McMahon-led company decided to reduce the number of PPV events it held every year, Battleground PPV was among the events that went under the scissors.

After a five-year break, the event was finally resurrected last year. This time around, however, it was brought back as an NXT event. NXT serves as a feeder brand for the promotion’s marquee ‘Raw’ and ‘Smackdown’ brands. Like its more prominent cousins, NXT, too holds weekly events but has a roster with relatively new and unknown wrestlers, some of whom get to fight on Raw and Smackdown based upon their performance in the development brand.