-- Nick Khan spoke to ESPN about the officially announced WWE/UFC merger into TKO and noted that with their new partnership, the possibility of UFC fighters who are nearing the end of the line in the MMA careers could find their careers extended by working with WWE, in the same sort of transition that Brock Lesnar and Ronda Rousey successfully navigated:
"UFC fighters are gonna stay focused on the UFC and WWE superstars obviously do something different in our ring...but you also see in the UFC people with big personalities who, once their UFC run is done, once the UFC and the fighter says, 'Hey, maybe now's the time to call it a day,' could those people have a longer life at WWE, an extended life with TKO? We think so."
-- UFC Executive Lawrence Epstein added:
"We've always thought there was just incredible opportunity to sort of roll up these two great brands and great organizations in the combat sports space. We were a little bit early in our thinking on this thing. And of course, it's really exciting and really a dream come true to have this come together. Where we want to get is where every UFC fan is a WWE fan and every WWE fan is a UFC fan."
