The Pro Wrestling Torch is reporting that Rob Van Dam’s contract with World Wrestling Entertainment will be expiring at the end of this summer. The six month mark came last week where he had to indicate to the company if he wanted the contract to automatically renew. According to sources, RVD opted to stop the auto-rollover, meaning he has to renegotiate his deal and renew or else he will become a free agent starting in September of 2007.
In regard to details of his current deal with WWE, he was estimated as being under a downside guarantee of around $400,000 a year. He earned that much while sitting out with an injury (which was said to be around $7,500 per week). When he returned from injury, he changed his payment method based on the shows he worked thinking he would earn more per week that way. Instead, a wide range of payments followed. With ECW not drawing well by itself for House Show and PPV events, RVD’s weekly paychecks saw a dramatic decrease. In the end however, it didn’t really matter since at the end of the contract year he will end up receiving a “make-good” check for however short his combined weekly pay was.
It should be noted that RVD is currently running the risk of WWE not offering him a downside guarantee as high as they had previously agreed on by not letting his contract roll over. One main reason he is considering leaving WWE right now, which isn’t big news for those who have followed the story, is that he is unhappy with the current direction of ECW and how it has been portrayed creatively. While sources close to RVD say he values money, he also takes pride in his work and hasn’t felt good about it lately. This is why it is very possible he could accept less money to jump to TNA and work fewer dates. With top stars such as Sting earning around $500,000 per year in TNA, it is believed that TNA could offer RVD a deal for around $250,000. While that is a significant decrease from what he was earning in WWE, in turn he would work fewer dates per month and have more creative satisfaction with his role. The only downside would be burning a bridge with WWE should he want to return in the future.
At 37 years old, sources close to Rob Van Dam say he may do one of three things: allow his deal with WWE to expire and jump to TNA, re-sign with WWE because the money is better or allow WWE to retain his intellectual property rights and sit on that for a year or two before making a decision about his wrestling career. Either way, we will continue to follow this situation as it develops.
