NWA president Billy Corgan wants to do a second EmPowerrr show, but he says there wasn’t enough TV-ready talent to justify doing it this year.
On August 28, 2021, the NWA held its all-women’s show, EmPowerrr, which was produced by Mickie James, alongside NWA 73. The show drew plenty of praise and featured an IMPACT Knockouts World Championship match, among other bouts, to showcase women’s wrestling. One year later, NWA 74 is right around the corner, and it’s clear that there won’t be another edition of the women’s event the weekend of the show.
In an interview with Steve Fall of NBC Sports Boston, Corgan was asked whether another EmPowerrr event was in the cards. He made it clear that he plans to bring it back, but there’s not enough TV-ready female talent on the open market right now. He stated that the majority of the top female wrestlers are already under contract with WWE or AEW.
“No, it is in the cards,” said Corgan. “In fact, I saw a headline recently that said I don’t plan on bringing EmPowerrr back, and that’s totally false. What it was is, we looked at EmPowerrr for this NWA 74 pay-per-view, and unfortunately there’s a paucity of female talent available on the open market because there’s such a demand now for female talent, both with WWE and AEW, that there just isn’t a ton of free agent talent available that can work at the television level. Is there enough talent? Absolutely. But you’re talking about putting people on an international pay-per-view, where you’re asking fans to pay money, you’re gonna put on an all-female pay-per-view.
“By the way, let’s all remember, if that pay-per-view doesn’t go well, you put people in positions they are not ready for, it’s gonna blow back, not only on those talents but on the company. So we will definitely run another EmPowerrr pay-per-view, absolutely, and hopefully next year. It’s just one of those things where it’s like it has to be the right time. Look at all the people under contract with AEW, look at all the people under contract with WWE, and you recognize probably 80 to 90% of the top talent on the female side is already under contract with those companies.”
Corgan continued by noting that EmPowerr is bigger than wrestling, and sometimes fans get lost in that importance. He emphasized that he wants to ensure that the next EmPowerrr is as good or better than the inaugural edition, which was a successful show. He repeated that he would “love” to bring EmPowerr back right now, but it’s not the right time.
“You have to be careful with those things,” said Corgan. “Look, when you put a spotlight and say this is about this thing, right, you’re saying to the audience that we fully endorse what’s happening, and what we’re doing is important for reasons behind wrestling. Sometimes people get lost in that, and that’s since the idea is enough to carry the mechanical side of the presentation. I’m very concerned that the next time we do an EmPowerrr event, and we will do it, that it is as good or better than the first one we did, which by the way is one of the most successful events we ever did.
“We trended worldwide number two on Twitter. Not a bad thing to pull off for an independent wrestling company. Mickie James did a tremendous job putting together the roster, but there were other companies participating. There was a lot of negotiating that went on. It just wasn’t in the cards for now, but absolutely we will do it again, and I would love to do it again. I would love to tell you right now we’re doing it again tomorrow. We’re not there yet.”
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