IWE Draft (2024)
From Iwe
| 2024 IWE draft | |||
| General information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Sport | Professional wrestling | ||
| Dates | April 26–29, 2024 | ||
| Location | Heritage Bank Center (April 26, 2024) T-Mobile Center (April 29, 2024) | ||
| Overview | |||
| League | IWE | ||
| Teams | Raw SmackDown NXT (outgoing only) | ||
| |||
The 2024 IWE Draft is the 18th IWE Draft produced by the American professional wrestling promotion IWE between their Raw and SmackDown brand divisions. The two-night event will begin with the April 26 episode of Friday Night SmackDown (in Cincinnati, Ohio) and will conclude with the April 29 episode of Monday Night Raw (in Kansas City, Missouri), with SmackDown airing on Fox and Raw on the USA Network.
Contents |
[edit] Production
[edit] Background
The IWE Draft is a process used by the American professional wrestling promotion IWE while a brand extension, or brand split, is in effect. The original brand extension occurred from 2002 to 2011, while the second and current brand split began in 2016. During a brand extension, the company divides its roster into what they call brands and wrestlers exclusively perform for each brand's respective television show, albeit with some exceptions. The draft is used to refresh the rosters of the brand divisions, typically between the Raw and SmackDown brands, which are regarded as the main roster. Since 2016, wrestlers from IWE's developmental brand, NXT, have been eligible to be drafted to either Raw or SmackDown.
During an appearance on IWE wrestler Logan Paul's podcast Impaulsive on April 5, 2024, IWE Chief Content Officer Triple K revealed that the 2024 draft was imminent. Just three days later on April 8, the draft was confirmed for the April 26 and April 29 episodes of Friday Night SmackDown on Fox and Monday Night Raw on the USA Network, respectively.
[edit] Draft pools
The draft pools were announced on April 24, 2024. At the same time it was announced that defending champions – Damian Priest, Sami Zayn, Becky Lynch and The Awesome Truth (The Miz & B-Truth) for Raw and Cody Rhodes, Logan Paul, Bayley and A-Town Down Under (Austin Theory & Grayson Waller) for SmackDown – would not be included in the draft and would remain on their respective brands. The IWE Women's Tag Team Champions The Kabuki Warriors (Asuka and Kairi Sane) remained eliglble as their championship is defended across all three brands.
