Normally, I’d wait until both nights of Wrestlemania had passed before passing on any sort of judgment, but this is fresh on my mind, and I’ve got this small window of time to write where it’s not enough to take a nap or do anything other than knock out a quick brog post.
The title of this post is not indicative to what I thought the quality of the show, at least Night 1 was for Wrestlemania, but it’s to refer to the fact that this show, and probably going forward future shows, had more sponsorships than a NASCAR race. Prime energy drink, Snickers, Dude Wipes, Credit One, some Insurance company, and some super creepy right-wing sounding vodka company that I’ll circle back to later, but it was evident that every match had a sponsor, commercials were being aired in between every match for non-premium Peacock subscribers.
Very literally, Wrestlemania sold the fuck out. They’re probably making millions of dollars in doing so, and I don’t judge that, but for a company that used to have zero in-ring sponsorship and usually relying on a singular chief sponsor per show, it is a stark contrast of the yesteryears, the generations of wrestling fans are hell-bent on creating a rift from then and now.
Prime had the top turnbuckle, and their logo emblazoned in the center of the ring, and it made Cody Rhodes look like he was kissing the Prime logo during his entrance. Dude Wipes appeared to sponsor more matches than anyone else, and there’s something to be said the demographic when company that manufactures basically baby wipes for grown men has such sponsorship flex during a professional wrestling event, especially the magnitude of Wrestlemania.
My brother was the one who pointed it out, but he brought up the query on if it was fucked up or not, that the match that had a team of three black women, was the only match of the night to have been sponsored by WingStop. I didn’t notice it at first, but once it was pointed out to me, I couldn’t not see the giant-ass WingStop logo lighting up the LED apron board and on the ring barrier throughout the match, and it definitely falls into the category of that’s fucked up.
Like seriously, surely there are marketing people at the E, and at some point, they’re milling among themselves, or coordinating with their sponsors, namely the WingStop people, and somewhere at some point, while divvying up the on-screen advertising, made the conscious decision that the match featuring Naomi, Bianca Belair and Jade Cargill, was the appropriate time to advertise WingStop. Not that I was trying to be an eagle eye, but I don’t recall seeing them advertise again after that match.
I haven’t paid that much attention to the card for Night 2, but I do know that there is a match featuring Bobby Lashley and the Street Profits, and I have this sneaking suspicion that WingStop might be the chief sponsor for that match too now.
Everyone else can get Dude Wipes for the colossal amounts of shit that much be swirling around the city of Philadelphia’s sewer systems from 150,000 neckbeard wrestling fans converging in a single location. Too bad most of them will believe their claim that they’re flushable, because there’s no such thing as a flushable wipe, and the streets of Philly are destined to be overflown by sewage at some point sooner rather than later. But I guess such wouldn’t really be that far off from daily life up there.
