Is There A WWE Boycott Happening? 

As you’ll already know if you pay attention to professional wrestling or television ratings trends, WWE’s ratings are currently in the toilet. They’re not just down; they’re way, way down. While you might lay some of the blame for that fact at the feet of the obvious situation that the world is facing at the moment, it’s doesn’t explain the downward trend entirely. With so many sports or entertainment shows unable to broadcast at the moment, a company that’s always prided itself on being both of those things ought to be gaining viewers, not losing them. Could there be something else happening that nobody else is picking up on? Could there, in fact, be a boycott happening among the company’s viewers? 

Over the years, viewership numbers for professional wrestling have gone up and down. The late 1990s were the hottest point in history for WWE, and right now is arguably the weakest. Peaks and troughs are to be expected with a form of entertainment and a company that’s been around for this long. It’s like playing UK slots and pumping money into them. Even if you start off with a few wins, you know full well that you can’t expect to carry on winning online slots forever. When the winnings dry up you have two options. You either close the online slots website and walk away, or you keep throwing money at it until your luck changes again. WWE have adopted the latter approach – but do they understand the odds they’re facing? 

Here’s a hard fact that it’s impossible for the company and the networks that air their shows to ignore. The episode of Monday Night Raw that aired on May 4th was the lowest rated in history. it pulled in a little under 1.7 million viewers. This is a show that targets three million, and now it’s down to barely half of that. There’s no way to dress that rating up as anything other than a disaster, and it’s a vote of no-confidence in the product that the company is currently airing. Vince McMahon and his management team can point at a whole number of factors, including the fact that rival promotion AEW is also posting lower-than-usual numbers at the moment, but that isn’t the only factor. They’ve lost somewhere between a third and a half of their regular audience since this time last year, and it’s becoming increasingly apparent that negative sentiment among fans might be contributing to that. 

WWE got themselves some bad press last month when they laid off a significant number of wrestlers, some of whom – Zack Ryder and Rusev especially – were popular with fans. There’s nothing especially unusual about this – WWE routinely lays off wrestlers every year – but the timing couldn’t be worse. The company is financially healthy and profitable, and no wrestler losing their job at the moment can expect to pick up a new position elsewhere immediately because shows aren’t happening. AEW hasn’t laid its wrestlers off, and is continuing to pay them even if they choose not to come to work for medical reasons. WWE sacrificed workers to boost profits for shareholders, and it didn’t come off well online. The ‘cancel WWE network’ hashtag that first appeared on Twitter five years ago after a particularly badly-received Royal Rumble event briefly trended online, as fans stood up for the fired performers. 

A second bone of contention with fans is the fact that Roman Reigns appears to have been temporarily purged from WWE history, with his name allegedly banned from even being mentioned by commentators, and clips of him expunged from montages. Famously, Reigns refused to work his scheduled WrestleMania match against Bill Goldberg because of health concerns. Those same health concerns – borne out of a desire to protect his newborn twins – are still keeping him away from work at the moment. There have been suggestions that McMahon is unhappy with Reigns’ decision to put his family first, and so his exclusion from the conversation is a form of punishment. Reigns has never been as popular with fans as McMahon once wanted him to be, but this perceived poor treatment of a cancer survivor who’s trying to do the best thing for his family has left a bad taste in the mouths of some fans, too. 

In addition to the factors mentioned above, there’s a political aspect to all of this. Somehow, WWE have gained permission to run live events in Florida after they were deemed an ‘essential service.’ The circumstances around this are more than a little murky, as the decision came after a Trump Super Pac donated $20m to Florida’s Republican Government Ron DeSantis. Linda McMahon – wife of Vince – heads up the organization that pushed the money through. It may not have been a bribe, but it looked like one to a lot of people. McMahon’s appointment on a panel advising Donald Trump about the state of the economy just days later didn’t help matters much. Trump is as divisive as any pro wrestling villain ever has been, and those that dislike him are uncomfortable with the McMahon’s tacit support for him. 

Sitting above all of this is Vince McMahon himself, who’s having a bad few months. First of all he couldn’t run WrestleMania they way he wanted to due to circumstances beyond his control. He then had to fold the XFL for a second time and declare it bankrupt after investing hundreds of millions of dollars in it. Some of the people affected by that sudden closure are suing him for huge amounts of money, and he’s also being sued by WWE shareholders who feel that he’s misrepresented the company’s situation to them. He’s under attack from all sides, and his mood backstage recently has been said to be extremely erratic even by his eccentric standards. All of this adds to an air of decay around the company, and a constant feed of negativity that appears to be pushing away viewers. 

It would be hard to deny that at least some fans have stopped tuning in because they’re unhappy with the company’s direction. Whether or not there are enough fans tuning out for that reason to affect the company’s long-term viewership is another matter, but right now there are around a million people missing on Monday nights who used to be glued to their sofas watching the action. Is it a boycott? The only way to find that out is to keep watching the figures to see if they ever return.