By James Caldwell, PWTorch assistant editor

Highlights from WWE's Second Quarter Conference Call

Participants: WWE CEO Vince McMahon and financial executive George Barrios.

- Vince McMahon downplayed the departure of Hulk Hogan from the fold, saying Hogan's departure will not have any material effect on WWE business.

The context of the question was WWE's talent pipeline to drive revenue growth and how WWE is developing stars of the future while mixing in legendary figures to help market the product.

"We feel very strong with where we are now," McMahon said, pointing to NXT. "When you look at what (Triple H) has done over the last several years and you look at the number of individuals who have come from NXT are now in main events, it’s an investment in the future and quite frankly it’s doing extremely well now.

"Long-term wise we feel really good as well. I mean there was a recent situation with Hulk Hogan who’s no longer with the organization and that doesn’t have any material effect. So again we were keen on individuals who can actually compete in the ring and derive benefit from that. So that’s where our emphasis really is."

- McMahon revealed plans for WWE to do a "Hard Knocks" style reality series, similar to HBO's series on one NFL team's preparation for the upcoming NFL season.

Barrios noted during the Q&A portion of the call that it's an expensive project, so they are waiting for the right time to budget for the show.

- Barrios described the Summerslam build-up as "WrestleMania in August" promoting Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker and adding Fanfest-type elements to the Summerslam Weekend in New York.

Barrios said they're not sure what the financial result will be in terms of being a huge difference-maker like Mania is every year. "We don’t have visibility to that. It’s not like we could see from a cadence standpoint the impact. So we don’t know until the event," Barrios said.

- Looking ahead to the Third Quarter, Barrios said WWE expects the Network to have "about 1.2 million subscribers," which would essentially be flat compared to the second quarter.

At the end of the second quarter, the Network had 1.156 million paid subscribers, a decline from the end of the first quarter. But, WWE is framing an increase from 1.156 million to 1.2 million as 3-5 percent Network subscriber growth in the third quarter.

WWE usually shies away from giving that type of guidance on a specific business segment, but Barrios said later in the conference that WWE is "becoming more and more comfortable in understanding kind of the cadence of acquisition and retention" of subscribers.

- Barrios said WWE will not disclose their conversion rate of Network trial subscribers to paid subscribers going forward.

WWE reported their conversion rate in recent quarters when they introduced sporadic trial months. However, with the Network now offering a free trial period to new subscribers every month, WWE decided it's "not something we're going to report on."

- Barrios acknowledged that awareness for the Network is "still relatively low" among WWE fans, according to surveys they've done. Barrios said WWE views that as an opportunity to increase Network subscribers over time.

- McMahon and Barrios talked about being part of a Facebook beta test to create new revenue through video views along with other big content companies.

[ LINK: Full Transcript of the Conference Call HERE via SeekingAlpha.com ]

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