According to a report from PWInsider, former WCW and WWE wrestler Marcus ‘Buff’ Bagwell has filed a lawsuit against the WWE in the US District Court of Connecticut on Tuesday. Bagwell is arguing that he is due royalties from the company for airing his matches on the WWE Network.
Bagwell believes that due to the pay-per-view (PPV) and home video royalties clause in his June 2001 WWE contract, the company has to pay up. The following are the terms of the contract mentioned about, and note that all references to ‘WCW’ are in regards to the WWE’s WCW brand after the buyout:
PPV events: “WCW shall allocate 5% of the Net Receipts paid to WCW with respect to the direct sale by WCW of WCW Pay-Per-Views to a talent royalty pool. Thereafter, WCW shall pro-rate payment to Plaintiff and all other talent appearing in such WCW Pay-Per-Views in the same proportion as was the compensation paid to Plaintiff for his appearances in the pay-per-views to the total amount paid to all talent for their appearances on the pay-per-views.”
Home video content: “The WCW Video Product is a compilation or derivative work of multiple individual WCW Pay-Per-Views in their entirety, such as a collection of videos, e.g., a WrestleMania box set, payment to Plaintiff shall be calculated as follows: 5% of the Net Receipts paid to WCW shall comprise the talent royalty pool, which shall first be pro-rated based on the number of individual videos in the compilation, and then the payment to Plaintiff for each video shall be consistent with the royalty payment to the Plaintiff at the time each individual video was first released.”
PWInsider is also reporting that Bagwell has asked for a trial by jury, and that the WWE has until November 9th to file a motion to dismiss the lawsuit. As of Wednesday the WWE has not yet been served with the lawsuit.
