There’s usually a buzz that surrounds any of WWE’s Big Four pay-per-view events. I did not feel any buzz this past weekend when WWE had their second-biggest event of the year, the 2022 Royal Rumble.
You could make excuses as to why this event didn’t feel very big, but the biggest one is that WWE no longer has larger-than-life stars.
WWE is getting paid big money for their weekly television, pay-per-views premium live events, and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia pays them handsomely for two big shows every year for the foreseeable future. They just had an investor call on Thursday and announced their first-ever year $1 billion+ in revenue ($1.095 billion in 2021). They aren’t motivated to make big stars right now. If they made another guy as big as The Rock or Steve Austin, they would have to pay them more and wreck their pay structure. They had their biggest profit ever and they still cited ‘budget reasons’ when they fired dozens and dozens of on-screen talent, and even more off-air employees.
