Quote:
Originally Posted by Nicky Fives
I highly doubt they make in the upper 6 figures....
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Yeah, I'm not buying that either. My dislike for them aside, I accept that they make a sustainable living off their geek shows. I think New Japan would pay them four digits per match, but there's no way they are making as much money as AJ Styles was with them. Over the past year they wrestled for New Japan 22 times. So New Japan would be paying them <$176,000. This is pure speculation on my part, but I don't imagine them paying The Bucks -- who are sizzle more than steak for their shows -- more than $2,500 per match. Even that seems steep. But I'll give them that, which takes their annual New Japan cheque up to $55,000. Not bad.
My gut tells me that ROH probably gives them a downside guarantee of $60,000 or something. I have no evidence of this, but just given the lack of funding they really seem to put into things, I sincerely doubt they are keeping The Bucks employed for $500,000 or anything. Jesus. For dudes who are trying to make a living off basically what corporate types would consider low-rent acting or stunt work, $60,000 downside is fucking generous.
That takes them up to about $115,000 with their New Japan/ROH work. I'm not sure if they get a cut of buys and that sort of thing. But when you figure in a bit of merch, and I'm sure they move a couple of hundred Bullet Club shirts, and they probably charge PWG, CHIKARA and other indies a few thousand per appearance. They're treated like bigger stars there than they are in Japan, and the appearances are more sporadic. I can see them charging $3,000 per appearance. They did 11 of those in the past year. That's an additional $33,000, taking them up to $148,000. I doubt they make more than 5% of that on merchandise. Do The Bucks even have their own merchandise, or do they just pimp Bullet Club shirts for New Japan?
I think $155,400 before Irwin R. Shyster comes a-calling is a generous estimation. That's honestly almost double what my gut wanted to guess (I was thinking in the $80,000-$100,000 range), and more than double what they are worth.
Keep in mind that The Bucks are always bragging about how much money they earn
in conjunction with their brags to creative freedom. In artists' terms, that usually just means they're not starving. $150,000 is not bad money by any stretch, and I doubt that the WWE would offer two scrawny kids set to be a tag team act that much money out the gate. Given their stature in independent wrestling and how they'd probably just want to polish off certain things about them, I can imagine developmental offers were probably in the $60,000 range. They could probably work their way up to what they make in Japan and the indies very quickly in the WWE, but keep in mind that is weighed against what they perceive as their freedom. They put capital on that, so $150,000 and freedom > $200,000 and being chained to the man. 50% of their t-shirt sales totaling $10,000 > 5% of their t-shirt sales totaling $10,000. That sort of thing.
But anyway, if The Young Bucks made over $500,000 each, that means that they would get paid over $6,000 each per match. That's $12,000 to book The Young Bucks for
one match. If tickets for a PWG show are $65 p/head, then the overall gate is going to be $32,500. That means The Bucks would make about a third of a show's gate for their appearance. That just doesn't add up. Truth be told, my earlier estimation of them making $3,000 each is probably a gross overestimation, because that means that The Bucks are still making over 1/6 of the gate.
I think The Bucks gloat because they have a weekly paycheck from ROH for over $1,000, which covers their living expenses, and they are basically guaranteed garnishing from Japan and the independents.