MLW owner Court Bauer has included a pair of controversial stars on his promotion recently.
Tessa Blanchard (signed to CMLL) and Masha Slamovich have both been welcomed with open arms by MLW despite allegations from their past.
Blanchard has faced allegations of abuse and racism towards her fellow talent and Slamovich has been accused of being in an abusive relationship with fellow star AKIRA (Alexander Atkisson).
Bauer told Fox News that he believe in giving people second chances.
“I believe in forgiveness. As a Christian, I believe in forgiveness. I think we’re so quick to condemn and everyone gets executed and then they’re just on the island of irrelevancy. They are to be forgotten. They are shunned forever, and there are definitely people in this world, in this business, that should be. And there’s people in this business that could be, but there are a lot of people that make bad mistakes, terrible mistakes, and they repent, and they realize their errors and their things that they could have done differently. They’re young people, they’re living in a time where they’re just on the go constantly, and then they get to settle down and they get to have perspective. But you gotta have the ability to see that and then you have a conversation with those folks, you see where they’re at, and I’m not saying one person in particular, but my approach has always been, yeah, you know, give second chances, give forgiveness,” he said.
“I mean, we’re so easy to condemn and I think that’s just something that if I hadn’t had a second chance, third chance, fourth chance, I mean I really sometimes would make a mess when I was younger and you don’t realize, you know, maybe this is it for me and thankfully people gave me another chance, and if they hadn’t, I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t be in this position, and I’m grateful for that,” he continued.
“And so forgiveness to me is like one of those things that really I wish would get an equal amount of enthusiasm, especially on social media, versus quick to just let’s go out there and let’s get our pitchforks and torches and go burn that person down. And once they’re torched, they’re satisfied and that person’s just devastated. Yeah, maybe rightfully, they should be in that moment, on a sabbatical, but let them, you know, it’s not all or nothing. I think there’s a little bit of nuance there, a little bit of gray area in there, and I think that’s where it’s important to like let them kind of go on their journey of realizing that and then see if there’s a conversation we had when the timing is right, when it’s appropriate. That’s kind of how … I’ve never really spoken about that deeply, but that’s really where I stand both my heart and in my mind about it,” he added.
Both Tessa Blanchard and Masha Slamovich are scheduled to wrestle at MLW’s Saturday Night SuperFight on Saturday, November 7, 2026, at Cicero Stadium in Chicago. Tessa Blanchard is taking on Keyra in her MLW debut and Masha Slamovich is taking on Zamaya.
The card streams live exclusively on VEEPS at 8 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. CT.
