Rogue League Wrestling

Rogue League Wrestling, better known as RLW or Rogue League, is a indie wrestling promotion that was formed on March 17th, 2019. RLW is the first wrestling promotion located in Cleveland, Ohio. The company was founded by friends and former WWE writers Joyce Malik and Cassandra Pierce. RLW currently has over 135 wrestlers signed to the promotion, as of May 2024. Their flagship show is Saturday Night Slammin (abbreviated as SNS) and their biggest pay-per-view (PPV) is All For One. SNS episodes air bi-weekly on Saturdays at 6 P.M. EST on RLW's Youtube channel. RLW is currently owned by Joyce Malik.
== History ==
=== Formation and beginning ===
After graduating from college in 2017 with a Bachelor's degree in sports management, Cassandra Pierce and Joyce Malik went to work for WWE together, both as creative writers. They worked at the promotion for about a year before leaving, due to creative conflicts between them and the higher-ups. In early 2018, Joyce, Cassandra, and a few of their former classmates joined forces to form a women-owned and queer-owned wrestling promotion of their own, which would showcase scripted wrestling catering to a more "women-dominated" and LGBTQ-dominated audience. According to surveys conducted by the team, queer and female audiences wanted to see more graphic wrestling and stories, fleshed-out in-ring personas, and an equal emphasis between the women’s and men’s divisions. 
After a few months of continuous discussions and debates, the team settled on using the name “Rogue League Wrestling” for their promotion. “We chose ‘Rogue’ because it suited the overall theme of our promotion: unhinged, chaotic wrestling and graphic story lines, breaking away from the mold of modern, mainstream wrestling.”, Cassandra Pierce claims. 
On January 3rd, 2019, RLW was successfully formed and trademarked. Before their big debut pay-per-view, which would be titled "After Hours", RLW recruited as many indie wrestlers they could, stocking up a 38-person roster, which consisted of 19 men and 19 women. 
On November 9th, 2019, RLW hosted the debut After Hours PPV. Notable wrestlers, such as Xavier Ellis (XAVi), Everett O'Connell (Jakson Moreno), Leona Godin, and Esme O'Connell (Queen Aliyah) made their debuts. 
On November 16th, 2019, RLW began airing their first episode of Saturday Nite Slammin' on a Youtube livestream, which racked over 58,000 views on its premiere. At the start, episodes would only air once a month, in order to preserve funds
=== COVID-19 era & impact ===
In March of 2020, due to rising COVID cases and quarantine, production of RLW episodes halted. When August came around, the venue where Saturday Nite Slammin’ was hosted, re-opened and allowed new episodes to be filmed. As a result, SNS switched to weekly episodes, which would later change the entire company as a whole.
Throughout late 2020 to 2021, RLW massively grew in popularity, especially due to their most popular faction at the time, Salvation, consisting of Xavier Ellis, Sylas Foster, Leona Godin, and Brynn Griffith, Out of all four members, Xavier was the most prominent, due to his physical appeal, in-ring combat, and his band, The Mane, which was rediscovered by several fans. 
=== "April Fools" announcement ===
Saturday Nite Slamming aired on TBS and sometimes TNT from April 9th, 2022 to April 22nd, 2022. Saturday Nite Slamming' began to re-air on TBS & TNT from July 30th, 2022, to September 7th, 2022. RLW went back to airing SNS on Youtube after September 7th.
=== Controversy and boycott ===
===== To view receipts and photos for this section of the page, click here! =====
On April 27, 2022, Tasha Singleton, a member of RLW's creative team, was released. She was reportedly released after a drawing she made of Xavier Ellis, where he is pictured as a demon, was leaked on the internet and shown to CEO Cassandra Pierce by art director Ashley Butler, who has had a long history of homophobia and transphobia, self-proclaiming herself as a “TERF”. Butler complained to Pierce that Tasha’s art was “overly sexual” and “insulting to women”. Joyce Malik viewed the art herself and refuted Butler’s claims, telling multiple sources that the art was fine and fitting to Xavier’s current persona at the time, while he was in the Demons Court faction. However, Pierce severely disagreed with Malik and the two argued over the matter. Pierce, not in favor of Malik’s approval of the drawing, released Tasha. 
A couple hours after Tasha's release, RLW wrestler DeAngelo Skinner posted details of the release of Tasha and backstage tensions online, deeming the release “unfair”. In support of Tasha, he organized a boycott of RLW, protesting for Tasha to get rehired, Ashley to get laid off, and Cassandra to either fix the issue or resign. Fellow wrestlers and fans of RLW joined the boycott, and decided not to compete or consume future episodes of Saturday Nite Slammin' or any RLW pay-per-views until further notice. 
Cassandra was alerted of the boycott DeAngelo and fans have organized, and wanted to make things right. She had a talk with Tasha and Ashley, discussing whether or not the firing was morally right or not. After two hours of discussing, Cassandra felt that Ashley was right about "holding Tasha accountable", and decided to not rehire Tasha. Joyce was not involved in the meeting, making the decision biased in nature, 
"Ashley is a great person, and I am proud of her for speaking up... Tasha will not be rehired and it will stay that way." - Ashley on a Zoom call with RLW employees and news reporters
A day after the boycott began, DeAngelo organized a two-day peaceful protest outside RLW Headquarters in Cleveland, OH. Many RLW wrestlers, employees, and some fans attended the protest. On the first day, Cassandra barred protesters from RLW HQ during the first few hours of the protest, claiming that she found their peaceful protest "disruptive and distasteful to her work". Despite their first protest day ending abruptly, their second day went on smoothly with no interruptions. 
On April 30, 2022, three days into the RLW boycott, Cassandra released 11 wrestlers and two referees. This was the first time in RLW history that a mass release occurred. The last release was in February 2021, after wrestler Leigh Rose (ROSE) was let go after she posted several anti-gay tweets. Four champions were released. Joyce Malik confirmed to several sources that the cause of the releases was due to a mental breakdown from Pierce, prompting her to overreact. 
* All members of SALVATiON (Xavier Ellis, Brynn Griffith (Women's IC Champ), Sylas Foster, Leona Godin 
* Alya Queen (TOTAL Women's Champ) 
* DeAngelo Skinner (1/2 of TOTAL Tag Team Champs) 
* Chris Nightmare (IC Champ) 
* Everett and Esme O'Connell 
* Christin Yamamoto 
* Valentine Zepida 
* Mateo Lavernge (TOTAL Titile Champ) 
* Jameson Elliott and Maria Perez (referees)
Many of the RLW wrestlers that were released, including Mateo and SALVATiON, were considering moving to a different wrestling promotion, such as AEW or WWE. SALVATION was apart of AEW for a time, and Xavier Ellis joined WWE, however, his time there was short-lived. 
On May 3rd, 2022, Cassandra Pierce resigned from RLW and put Joyce Malik and friend Tony Khan in charge. Tony’s job in RLW was short-lived, ending in September due to RLW’s temporary split from AEW. Despite the losses in revenue, all of the wrestlers released re-signed with RLW and the company is remaining popular and financially stable. 
In April of 2024, Cassandra Pierce released a formal apology, claiming that she overreacted and didn’t understand what she was doing at the time of the boycott. Fans and wrestlers weren’t fond of the apology, with one wrestler, JADE, accusing Pierce of workplace harassment. However, these accusations are currently in investigations and have not been verified, 
=== Split from AEW ===
On September 7th, 2022, RLW announced that they would be splitting away from All Elite Wrestling, after backstage drama between wrestlers and CEO Tony Khan was made public. With the split, RLW wrestlers can no longer compete on AEW programming and live shows. The same goes for AEW wrestlers competing at RLW. Also with the split, SNS would no longer be aired on TBS and TNT. 
Almost a year later, CM Punk's AEW contract was terminated, after he had another backstage altercation, this time with Jack Perry. In after Punk was terminated, RLW released a statement, saying they were willing to make a new deal with AEW. The new deal was confirmed and signed in December of 2023, and will last for 4 years. 
== List of pay-per-views ==
* All for One
* RISE
* After Hours (Valentine's Day/Halloween/Holiday Season)
* Lock and Key
* Villa of Violence
== Current Champions ==
* RLW TOTAL Champion: Mateo Lavernge (2022-2022) Xavier Ellis (2021-2022), DeAngelo Skinner (2020-2021), Everett O’connell (2020-2020)
* RLW TOTAL Women’s Champion: Alya Queen (2022-2022), Leona Godin (2021-2022), Latavia Palmer (2021-2021)
* RLW Men’s TAG TEAM Champions: Cyclone System (2022-2022), Hot n’ Cold (2021-2022)
* RLW Women’s TAG TEAM Champions: Heather Hunter & Cameron (2021-)
* RLW Intercontinental Champion: Chris Nightmare (2021-2022) Aaron Tanaka (2021-2021)
== Trivia ==
* The font "Ethnocentric" is used for the current logo. "Thunderblack" was used for the logo from 2021-2022. The font used for its 2019-2021 logo has yet to be identified.
* All for One 2022 would've taken place at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse in Cleveland, Ohio, before the RLW boycott. Last year, the pay-per-view took place at FirstEnergy Stadium with limited capacity.
* Before becoming alliances with AEW, and before they split off, IMPACT! stars would compete on Saturday Nite Slammin.