WWE is at a strange crossroads from a political standpoint currently. It’s no secret the McMahon family supports soon to be former President Donald Trump, considering Linda is a chairman on a pro-Trump super PAC. The company has enjoyed the support of Trump and many people believe Vince McMahon will welcome Trump back to WWE television in his life post-presidency.
However, an interesting statistic was brought up by Twitter user @conanedogawa316.
Going back, the user isn’t wrong. Dream hasn’t appeared since losing to Tommaso Ciampa on November 4th, the day after Election Day, Austin Theory was last seen on NXT October 21st where he “quit” the company, and Lars Sullivan was last seen on SmackDown November 6th in a sit down interview, the night before several outlets projected Biden to officially win the election.
There’s a counterpoint to at least two of these. Theory’s disappearance could be selling his angle of having quit the company, and Sullivan is the victim of not enough time on SmackDown as they’ve emphasized building up storylines for Survivor Series. Velveteen Dream may just be the victim of not enough time on NXT and too many talents they want to put on television. Big E’s supposed segment that would have placed him on the SmackDown Survivor Series team was cut for lack of time last week according to some reports.
There is one thing these three talents have in common: they’ve all been accused of problematic behavior.
Theory was named as a perpetrator in the #SpeakingOut movement, and Dream’s alleged misdeeds are enough that social media has constantly called on WWE to fire him anytime he shows up on television longer than five seconds? And Lars Sullivan? Lars’ dirt seems to be growing and growing even after his return to television.
Could this be WWE trying to sweep some situations under the rug with the impending arrival of the Joe Biden administration? Vince has often felt emboldened, almost untouchable at times. He’s managed to slide his way through a lot of things and even some terrible controversy has yet to take him down. Fans protest the WWE/Saudi Arabia deal and Vince continues to make money. The recent third party ban seems to have Vince feeling like he can get away with anything, especially after the company terminated Zelina Vega for “breach of contract.”
Translation: You found a loophole we didn’t close and then you talked unionizing.
Vince isn’t a stupid man. He seems deaf to the fans at times, but he’s not dumb. He’s heard Andrew Yang wants to make sure he’s looked into, but the fact Donald Trump is holding up the transition of power is probably giving Vince a chance get his own affairs in order while he keeps waiting to see if the rumblings Andrew Yang may find his way into Biden’s cabinet are true. Yang, a wrestling fan himself, wants to see the roster succeed professionally and financially. Vince trying to flex his muscle to see how far he can stretch the term “independent contractor” can go is something he seems to be doing.
Will Vince skate away unscathed here? Probably, it’s happened before. However, if Yang is as serious as he sounds, this is the first challenger he’s had in a political arena that actually wants to challenge his decrees in professional wrestling. Do I think Vince is about to have some difficult times ahead? Absolutely.
A major factor in this situation is, now hear me out, Paige. The WWE is in an incredibly difficult position trying to enforce this ban on her. She can’t make money performing in the ring, and for them to make a public story of a performer who suffered a career ending injury by forcing her off of something she has publicly stated has helped her mental health as she comes to terms with not being able to wrestle again? You know, the thing her entire family has built their lives on to the point the WWE helped produce a movie about her life? It would be a terrible move.
And if the train of thought is that Vince is going to open up a streaming service to counterpunch against Twitch and Mixer? One word, Vince: TOUT.
The truth is that this is probably all one big coincidence. Lars could show up on the next SmackDown and destroy someone to continue his push. Theory and Dream may show back up in NXT any week now. More importantly, we will continue to see the referee who has his own Parler account show up on television. Fans will threaten to stop watching, but Vince lives life like it’s Whose Line Is It Anyways?. Everything is made up and the (ratings) points don’t matter.
We’ll see if some of this matters after Joe Biden officially takes office.
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