Forced celebrity involvement, unneeded breaking of the 4th wall, and uninspired, repetitive, and questionable storytelling. Is this describing WCW in the year 2000 or WWE in the year 2026, or both?
The final calendar year of WCW’s existence was a rough year for the company that only a few years earlier was on top of the wrestling world. It was even rumored the Ted Turner-owned promotion could be the one to kill Vince McMahon’s WWF as the company struggled to find a new identity after the end of the 80’s boom and failure of the New Generation.
WCW in 2000 is widely regarded as one of the worst years of any promotion between terrible creative choices and record losses. A constantly shifting creative team, including two infamous runs by Vince Russo as the head writer and the return of Eric Bischoff after being relieved of his duties in 1999. This inconsistency was visible in the show as angles and feuds would randomly stop, start, or wildly change directions as WCW slowly hemorrhaged viewers.
An attempt to relaunch the New World Order failed to even get off the ground due to Bret Hart’s career-ending injury from a sidekick by Goldberg at Starrcast 1999. Bischoff and Russo were tasked with working together, leading to the infamous relaunch in mid-2000 that kicked off the failed New Blood storyline and infamously Bash at the Beach 2000. Russo would be gone by the end of the year as WCW limped into 2000.
The company looked to be on the cusp of rebuilding with The Magnificent Seven storyline kicking off to try and anchor the main event and upper-mid card scenes. Attempts were also being made to rebuild the rest of the card, including a renewed emphasis on the cruiserweight division. It was during this time 2000s mainstays like AJ Styles, Elix Skipper, Lance Storm, Shane Helms, and Jimmy Yang, among others, got their first shot on national TV.
Unfortunately, WCW was one of the biggest casualties of the Time Warner-AOL merger and the internet bubble popping. The losses accrued over the last two years by WCW and an executive team that had no interest in keeping professional wrestling on the books effectively killed the promotion, as a bid to buy it by Eric Bischoff and Fusient Media was shot down after new Chairman and CEO of Time Warner Broadcasting Jamie Kellner basically said Fusient could by the company but wasn’t getting the primetime TV timeslots originally promised. It effectively killed the deal’s value and WCW was bought shortly after for the fire-sale price of $4.3 million.
The same creative malaise has been happening to WWE in 2026. Signs of a downturn started to appear in 2025, though many of these cracks were covered up John Cena’s retirement run. When the calendars turned over to 2026, though, these cracks became much more obvious and noticeable starting with a poorly received Royal Rumble due to the overall quality of the show and that it took place in Saudi Arabia. A poorly received WrestleMania build up and down the board followed, and it hasn’t gotten any better just two days out from SummerSlam Night One.
Unlike WCW, WWE’s creative team is largely the same team it has been since WWE entered its most recent boom period around mid-2023. This has led to many fans and critics suggesting this is a mix of burnout on part of the creative team and corporate mandates from WWE’s parent company, TKO Group Holdings.
WrestleMania 42 is the best example from this year of the corporate mandates at what many fans felt was its absolute worse. It was most evident on Night One when the opening match for the free ESPN portion involved internet personalities iShowSpeed and Logan Paul, though Paul is also a full-time contracted performer for WWE. The main event of the night which saw Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes defending the title against Randy Orton became an fourth-wall breaking feud that seemingly became more about Pat McAfee, Jelly Roll, and the state of WWE, than it did about what is supposed to be one of the top belts in the promotion.
The same has taken place ahead of SummerSlam, though it doesn’t appear that many of the celebrities and sports figures featured on WWE TV ahead of their big summer show will appear on it. However, at the July 18th Saturday Night’s Main Event in New York City’s Madison Square Garden, Karl-Anthony Towns and NBA Finals MVP Jalen Brunson from the 2025/2026 NBA Champions New York Knicks were featured heavily. Brunson, specifically, was part of a main event segment involving himself and WWE World Champion Roman Reigns that also involved some build to Reigns’ SummerSlam match against Seth Rollins who was joined by Tyrese Haliburton of the Indiana Pacers. Despite the reception in the building, the wider reception from fans watching at home was mixed at best.
A little over a week later, controversial boxer Ryan Garcia ran in during a Joe Hendry and Danhausen concert segment on Monday Night Raw. Garcia, who has faced severe public backlash for many of his openly racist comments in the past including claiming membership to the Klan and referring to the LGBTQIA+ community as a “cult.” He has also been suspended for failing drug tests and was booted from the WBC for a year-and-a-half for comments against the Muslim community. His involvement, on top of the extremely negative reception to the entire segment, contributed to what many consider the worst Raw of 2026.
This was all in the middle of what many fans and commentators in the space have described as a lackluster SummerSlam build at the best of times.
All this has led to plenty of, frankly, deserved comparisons to WCW specific brand of bad wrestling TV in the year 2000. It’s only been exacerbated by season three of WWE Unreal on Netflix, which many felt only opened WWE’s creative up to even more criticism after clips of Triple H saying he was “worried” fans would think WWE was trying to shove Bron Breakker “down their throats.” Many were quick to point out the irony in this given it was Triple H saying it and how fans now look back at Jey Uso’s 2025 push that appeared to start strong but ultimately petered out.
Unlike WCW in 2000 and heading into 2001, WWE’s future seems fairly safe for at least the immediate future.
WWE has been the one arm of TKO Group Holdings generating massive revenue to try and chip away at TKO’s $4.96 billion debt due, mostly, to the UFC side of the merger. It has led to further and further price gouging by WWE as it attempts to monetize every possible avenue and raising ticket prices exponentially. While it has contributed to a noticeable downturn in attendance, with both nights of SummerSlam crossing over 30,000 sold for each night at the U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a building capable of holding over 70,000 people based on setup.
Unfortunately for fans, this financial security means WWE doesn’t have to rush to address these issues even as they become more glaring. It has been reported that there’s “increased pressure” on WWE’s creative, but it remains to be seen if any potential changes would have meaningful and immediate impact especially with the mandates handed down by TKO’s executives in the past.
And then there is the looming cloud of WrestleMania 43 in 2027, emanating from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The announcement was met with overwhelming negativity from fans given Saudi Arabia’s history of human rights violations and treatment of women and the LGBTQIA+ community. The perceived fumbling of Bron Breakker and missteps with Oba Femi hasn’t helped things, either. It wouldn’t be surprising if The Rock vs. Roman Reigns was on the table for WrestleMania 43 between Rock’s recent Hollywood disappointments and the amount of money Saudi Arabia would likely pay for a Rock match at this WrestleMania.
This is all to say fans may not have seen the worst of this creative downturn from WWE due to its financial security. It isn’t to say everything is entirely safe as their ten year deal with Netflix for Raw having an out option for Netflix after five years. However, since they are only in the second year of that contract, WWE and TKO’s higher-ups may not feel the immediate pressure to try and course correct. Instead, it seems as though Triple H and executives like Nick Khan and Mark Shapiro are happy to write off fan complaints by either telling them to “just enjoy the show” or they don’t need long-term fans and they’ll simply make new ones.
But the bill always comes due, and if things do indeed get worse, WWE may find itself holding a pretty massive bill at the end of it.
Minimum Wage Nerd 