Why No A-Train or Albert Figure?

I agree but Trish was the T&A so we need her from that era haha

I would kill for an Albert fig with the Intercontinental Title and long pants. Dude was beast

Who doesn’t need a test

That depends on why they stopped using their previous account.

Me. I don’t want or need a Test. If it wasn’t for the fact he was the guy in the ring when Triple H interrupted the wedding ceremony I wouldn’t remember a thing about his wrestling career. He just never impressed me. But I do hope he gets made for those who do want him. But for me the R3 I have is all I will ever need if I decide to display him on my shelves.

I wouldn’t read too much into cards meaning merch deal

Cards go into the hundreds and while you get multiples of the big stars you need a lot of talent. Also someone doesn’t carry a card pack like they do a figure snd there’s a big cost difference

An Albert card in a pack of 6 for $1 for someone trying to get a set is zero risk

An Albert figure where he is the sole reason to buy and retails at $10+ is a bigger investment

I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s levels in the merch deals we don’t know about and they may have a ‘mini license’ to allow things like cards, stickers, references in books etc

It's not a matter of reading into things.  I've been in the card industry for a long time as a dealer and discussed it someone who handles licensing for Topps at a trade show.  They confirmed that they don't do outside deals, and work from WWE-contracted talent rosters.

A lot of legends contracts are in the public domain (lawsuits), and for lower level talent they're pretty standard.  Are there some exceptions that have limited contracts or are restricted by pre-existing deals (ie Hogan when he was still under figure contract with Storm but had other WWE merch)?  I'm sure there are.  But for 95% of folks signed, it's likely a blanket deal that is going to cover a wide range of merch.  Turnaround time and cost of production is much lower on things like cards, so we've seen folks like The Goon, Chyna, Strongbow, Paul Orndorff post-lawsuit show up there in some cases years before Mattel made a figure.

Like you said - they can throw Albert into a card set and it makes zero functional difference in sales whether they included him or say The Hurricane.  For Mattel, releasing an Albert figure would require tooling a head, design team time, etc, and then they rely on consumers wanting that specific figure, and balancing whether Albert would sell better than The Hurricane, or a 500th Warrior figure.  It's not apples to apples.  But there's also no added risk to WWE for merch deals to be wide reaching - talent are paid a modest advance and then a percentage on merch sales after that advance is reached.  It's just a question of which talent from that pool specific licensees use.

Looking at video game or trading card rosters isn't gospel.  But it can give a pretty good idea which way the wind is blowing.

What are you talking about? During his run, Albert (a.k.a. Matt Bloom) was one of the most safe, reliable, and well-traveled hands that Vince had.

From being Giant Bernard over in Japan to being a big guy in the US who could work, Albert was great for his time even if he never got past the midcard. In fact, part of the reason that he’s such a good trainer is because he has the fundamentals down and has the personality to make it work when training the younger guys.

He’s a stable, if not predictable hand to have around. Just the fact that he’s been in the business this long should tell you all you need to know, since big guys who don’t have the fundamentals down are usually pretty shorted-lived when it comes to their careers.

Albert isn’t that. I’d love to have a figure of him just so that there’s another big menace type character in my collection.

I was going on the principle of what Steve has said before when prople have referenced legends in games snd he has said game appearance doesn’t = available to mattel so I assume there’s levels of contracts?