Recently, more than 30+ people including wrestlers, backstage personnel, and corporate personnel that were with WWE for years and even decades were let go to in the 3rd worst week in wrestling history during my 20+ years as a wrestling fan.
This article is definitely not about be “bashing WWE to suck other wrestling promotions d***s”. This article is to explain my personal views regarding WWE’s “Black Wednesday” because I have been heavily thinking about this for a week now and wanted to put down my thoughts about it in writing because there are many podcasters & defenders on social media that are so pro-WWE that really don’t understand the business side of wrestling works nowadays. They’re also not the type to understand that regardless of whether they’re a fan of the person as a wrestler or not, they’re also human just like the rest of us. These pro-WWE podcasters and defenders on social media in particular nowadays that will defend WWE tooth and nail while constantly shitting on other promotions just to try to make WWE look like the endgame for young and upcoming wrestlers makes me physically ill.
I’m the type of wrestling fan that ain’t afraid to address issues that currently exists in not only AEW, Impact, NXT, ROH, WWE, but also at a lot of Indy promotions because I am definitely not one of those wrestling fans who will suck any promotion’s d**k by constantly shitting all over these other wrestling promotions just for the sake of making that one wrestling promotion feel like the endgame for a lot of young wrestlers. Unlike many fans who are extremely pro-WWE nowadays, I’m a “I enjoy all wrestling” type of guy because that’s my mentality.
The C-Virus Pandemic has currently affected wrestling in a major way from the major promotions like AEW, Impact, NXT, & WWE taping shows in front of no audience (which I just can’t find to become emotionally invested in). I haven’t watched any wrestling from any of the major wrestling promotions in a good while because I find absolutely NO enjoyment watching these lifeless empty arena shows at all.
Indie wrestling is being the most affected by The C-Virus Pandemic because they’re not only doing any shows, but they have absolutely no money coming in from the people who attend their shows to see their favorite wrestlers compete. God forbid, but if The C-Virus Pandemic continues to go the way it is now, it could do one thing that WWE has viciously tried to do over the years and failed. It could kill indie wrestling as we know it. But I am very optimistic that indie wrestling will definitely become more stronger after The C-Virus Pandemic is completely wiped off the planet.
I understand the business side of wrestling side nowadays more than ever during my 20+ years as a wrestling fan. I understand why some of the 30+ people from WWE had to be let go for legit reasons, but to say they had to release these 30+ people to “save up money” and calling themselves “essential services” is complete utter bullshit and I will explain why.
The reason why I called WWE’s “reason” to release 30+ people to “save enough money” complete bullshit when they made like a billion dollars last year and currently have $500 million in reserves because this completely shows that WWE would deliberately sell people up the river for The Bottom Line because that’s their #1 priority nowadays and even Vince McMahon said in that famous promo that I vividly remember he cut on an episode of Raw 20 years ago “It’s All About The Money!!!” & that statement rings so true today.
WWE nowadays certainly doesn’t value loyalty as they released people that have been with the company for over 20+ years like Kurt Angle, Mike Chioda, & Mike Rotunda aka IRS who’s Bray Wyatt & Bo Dallas’s father. We live in a modern day society that heavily values “Money Over Everything” & WWE is certainly no exception to that because WWE will stop at nothing to make money to the point of forcing wrestlers to fly to The Performance Center in Orlando, Florida for the live tapings of Raw, Smackdown, & NXT that not only puts their health and lives at risk of potentially catching The C-Virus, but that shows how absolutely ruthless WWE has been in ensuring that Their Bottom Line is filled up even at the expense of putting their own wrestlers at risk.
WWE has developed a bad reputation for one particular legitimate reason amongst some in The IWC nowadays for hoarding too much talent for the sole purpose of deliberately keeping them away from other promotions because they don’t want these other promotions to capitalize on the talent, so they go out of their way to not only lock them up in NXT which is basically a talent storage house for WWE to keep away from other promotions. Another way they go out of their way to keep other promotions from signing them is to throw these big money 5 year contracts that aren’t “guaranteed” despite what the dirtsheets say about them. These are two of the many ruthless business practices that WWE has engaged in over the last few years.
The Conclusion - The one thing that we wrestling fans must understand is that no matter what the situation is whether it’s a tragedy or a massive pandemic like The C-Virus is right now, wrestling brings us all together and will overcome this pandemic together.
By Kwame Shakir
