There have been numerous changes behind the scenes at both WWE and AEW in recent months.
WWE announced this week that Lee Fitting had been hired as Head of Media and Production, succeeding Kevin Dunn, the longtime WWE head of production.
According to previous reports, some WWE employees were unhappy with Fitting’s hiring. To learn more about that internal reaction, click here.
AEW fired Kevin Sullivan, its Vice President of Post-Production, last month. The decision was made by Mike Mansury, Senior Vice President and Co-Executive Producer. Before joining AEW, Mansury worked for WWE and was considered Dunn’s replacement when he retired. However, Mansury felt he couldn’t advance at the rate he desired and left the company.
While speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer stated that many WWE employees wanted Mansury to return before Fitting was hired.
“Yeah. So Lee Fitting came from ESPN. He was let go in August. He did Monday Night Football. He was very responsible for College Game Day. It was an interesting move because almost everybody expected someone from wrestling to be promoted. Whether it was somebody in the that was already working there with Kevin Dunn in WWE, which is the prediction, obviously, a lot of people wanted them to get Mike Mansury or thought that they would make a play for Mike Mansury, although I think that that would have been impossible. I mean, a lot of people just think, ‘Oh, you know, WWE snapped its fingers, they can get anyone.’ And the reality is his contracts are contracts. It ain’t that easy when you have that. So when I kept hearing his name, I kept saying like, ‘He’s under contract, and it happened at any time soon.’ So they went outside which makes sense because Nick Khan is the president of the company and Nick Khan’s connections are all in the sports world. Many times, whether it was Jimmy Smith or Adnan Virk, he made many calls that came to bringing people from the outside sports world into WWE both office, many office people he brought in were outside sports world people. So, it’s not a surprise. Wrestling is a different world, but maybe someone who’s very experienced in a different world can impart the real world into wrestling. Maybe not. Who knows?” Meltzer stated.
Mansury worked for WWE from March 2009 to May 2020 and was considered a “big part” of Triple H’s regime. Mike Johnson of PWInsider.com reported that some within WWE at the time dubbed Mansury the “next” Kevin Dunn, and that a number of people were “shocked” by his departure.
(h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription)
