Since he bought the WWE from his father, Vince McMahon has broken through many barriers to take his company to the next level, and one of those was to become main stream.
To achieve that, he brought in various celebrities for the first WrestleMania, and prior to that Cyndi Lauper started managing Wendi Richter.
Are Too Many Celebrities Bad for WWE?
It was the start of the Rock and Wrestling era that was as fun as much as it was a spectacle, and it helped take professional wrestling main stream and bring in droves of fans that otherwise may never have bothered with the product.
It’s a practice the WWE has maintained for the last forty years since with varying degrees of success.
Whether it’s been Liberace and Muhammad Ali at WrestleMania 1, Lawrence Taylor against Bam Bam Bigelow in WrestleMania 11, and now Bad Bunny and Logan Paul the last couple of years with plenty of others joining in.
But that raises the question on whether or not too many celebrities hurt the WWE.
Maintaining a balance
It’s a fine line to walk to maintain the balance between attraction and making a mockery of the business, and we don’t have to look any further than WCW and some of the decision they made.
Like having David Arquette with the world title.
Becky Lynch addressed this when she sat down with Stephen A. Smith on his Know Mercy Podcast.
“That can be a bit of a problem. Personally, and from a work ethic standpoint, that you put all of this effort into this all year round, and when the big shows come, when the big stadiums come, and there’s 80,000 people, you want to receive your flowers for that hard work you’ve been putting in all year round so that we can do this.
“It is fantastic, but it cannot be what this business is. We need those people that are wrestling three, four times a week that can carry this, that are thinking about this constantly, that it is their sole focus. We need that, because yes, the Pat McAfees of the world or the Logan Pauls can have three matches a year or one match and we can put a spotlight on them and give them their kudos and their flowers and say, ‘Well done.’ But this business is hard. This business is so hard and it’s tough, and it’s skill and it’s craft, and without those people that know how to do this in the way that we do it, then it will die.”
She made a great point and while attractions put people in the seats, it’s important to not ignore the meat and potatoes of the business.
What do you think about celebrities in wrestling? Let us know in the comments below.
SUBSCRIBE NOW: Get The Overtimer’s Hottest Stories, Breaking News and Special Features in your email, CLICK HERE!
