Since Wrestlemania there’s been nothing but stories about John Cena winning an amazing 17th title, blah blah blah… It’s a “History making moment”, yadda yadda yadda…
Like…of course he did. It’s the storyline. It’s quite literally “in the script”.
This isn’t an achievement. Why is this in my sports news next to last night’s hockey scores instead of next to an article about who was the bitchiest on the lastest episode of Real Housewives?
I get it. I loved Wrestling growing up. Back when we all WERE pretending it was real; Macho Man, Hulk Hogan, The Undertaker, etc… But I thought at some point they steered into the whole “entertainment” aspect when most of us grew the hell up and clued into the absurdity of it all.
I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s a load of bots because Netflix spent the GDP of a small country on it.
People are excited about the writting in the show they watch. 90 banillion articles came out about Severence too.
People that are fans then play into the kayfabe, as thats a large part of the point of the show.
Let people enjoy things, they arent harming you by talking about wrestling.
Wrestling is a form of theatre.
Its just the high octane, sensationalized, ridiculous, coked up, american pop culture version of Theatre.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnvSs3HEz2o excellent video where someone talks about why Wrestling got popular
Wrestling Isn’t Sports. But it also isn’t fake. Not entirely. the outcomes are usually scripted, and theres a card they are usually following (Sometimes, they aren’t. Whether its a botch, a shoot, etc) (botch means a mistake, a shoot means someone’s not acting, and they’re throwing real punches)
but the acrobatics and "stunts’ people are doing, are very real. an incredible amount of effort and skill is needed to have the physical ability and timing to make the stuff look real for the kids and cameras
thats why its called sports entertainment,
I think OP is specifically asking why Pro Wrestling is being treated like it’s real in some sports publications.
Just to further your point. It’s like Cirque du Soleil, scripted, but they are really doing those moves.
Makes me wonder how ‘real’ roman gladiators were.
Far as I know, not very.
Real combat with weapons is not all that entertaining.
You nick a guy in the right place and he’ll die a slow agonising death in the locker room, far from the eyes of the crowd, then you’re down an athlete and even the enslaved ones aren’t cheap, and they need training, and housing, and feeding, etc.
Moreover this may happen at any point of the fight and that’s not very satisfying to watch, think Mike Tyson one-hit KO vs a 20 minute banger with back nad forth.
So obviously you’d make it look good and take your time, send the crowd home happy. Even were it a real competition, which it was at times.
Gladiators that were intantionally killed in the arena were “bought” by the editor (the person paying for the games overall), and it was at a premium. Afterall the lanista got a major cut of their stable’s wins, so you’d have to cover the sum of all the potential winnings of the rest of their careers, and then some, to make it worth it.
So it wasn’t quite pro wrestling, but it was definitely close, the economics of it make more sense that way, and the (relative) longevity of certain documented gladiators also.
Interesting thanks. Not all that surprising though.
We’ve regressed into believing a lot of imaginary things are real.
Wrestling is the least of our worries.
It’s a soap opera with fighting. Of course fans are talking about the characters and the story. Nobody talking about anything that happens in a soap Opera will add that it’s just fiction, they’re talking about the events.
I mean people get excited over TV shows all the time? Doesnt have to be real for people to talk about it and be excited
This isn’t an achievement. Why is this in my sports news next to last night’s hockey scores instead of next to an article about who was the bitchiest on the lastest episode of Real Housewives?
Because wrestling is a huge business and it has a lot of overlap with combat sports fans.
Like…of course he did. It’s the storyline. It’s quite literally “in the script”.
Yesn’t.
An actor breaking the record for most best performer oscars won in a career would also be newsworthy, yet you can absolutely pay your way to an oscar.
John Cena is remarkable in that he’s such a draw that a multi-billion dollar organization decided to set his career as the new ceiling to break for the next big star, by breaking a record untouched for decades, might I add. That’s newsworthy.
That isn’t scripted, that is a performer being skilled at what he does, as much as I personally don’t enjoy his work.
But I thought at some point they steered into the whole “entertainment” aspect when most of us grew the hell up and clued into the absurdity of it all.
This is like, the most “I learned something so the rest of the world learned it with me” I’ve ever seen.
Wrestling has been known to be fake for over a century; newspapers stopped reporting on it as a factual sport in the early 1900s.
Hell, it was known to be fakery before it was ever televised.
Kids don’t know until they do.
It’s live action martial arts anime theater. No more, no less.
tl;dr: Should John Cena’s record-breaking 17th title win be in the papers? absolutely. Sports section? Maybe, depends. It is a “sport” in the same way that figure skating or synchronised swimming is.
WWE is less wrestling and more a glorification vehicle for the MacMahon syndicate. All the real pro wrestling is on AEW or the circuits now.
No, we know the outcome’s predetermined. Last year’s Wrestlemania was basically written six-months ahead of time.
It’s still fun to watch though, and the athletes do some amazing shit.
I wouldn’t call them athletes if their skill isn’t what determines the outcome. Performers certainly like cirque du Soleil.
I wanted to be a pro wrestler in my teens, I hung around with local wrestlers and did ring crew work from time to time when a show was local. Eventually they started giving me some training and let me tell you it takes a lot of athletic ability to make those moves look good without injuring the other person.
Just because the outcome is predetermined doesn’t mean the lead up to the outcome isn’t an athletic competition. They are competing in that ring, it’s just that they are competing for a chance at a belt and earning the belt is the equivalent of a promotion in the workplace. Champions get better pay and more opportunities.
Why not? What definition of ‘athlete’ are you even using? Did you just decide this?
athlete Athletes compete or strive against others to attain a goal, TV wrestlers perform, or enact a feat before an audience.
You could say there goal is to perform for that audience, as a team….of athletes.
No idea why my previous comment shows as quoted, but whatever
My argument is that if they were actually competing that would mess with the performative nature of the storytelling.
Freestyle skiing, snowboarding, skating, bmx, motocross, mountain bike etc says you’re wrong.
While it’s possible to compete in events for most or all of those things competition is only a tiny part of it.
wwe have to labe them as sports performers, so they arnt subject to any regulatory issues, like with roids and standards. we know alot of the wrestlers was on PEDS, rock and cena was the most obvious.
LOL
Go try to do moonsault off a steel cage without breaking your neck and then you can judge.
Still not an athlete.
Who cares? Let people enjoy it if it makes them happy.
Wrestling isn’t Wrestling
I remember liking that video the first time I saw it. If I remember correctly though, the creator of that video had quite a few sexual abuse allegations against him and I wasn’t really into it after that came to light.
I had no idea. Thanks for enlightening me. I’ll forgo referencing Landis from now on. Learn something new everyday…even if the new knowledge is old and awful.
Wrestling and the media surrounding it will always be written/performed as though it is real. There were just as many adults that knew it was fake when we were kids that didn’t. It’s santa clause and easter bunny style culture. Once you are disillusioned, if you want to continue being involved, you join in on the act.
Have you listened to any sports commentators? They all talk about <insert current game on tv> as if it’s the most important, world-changing event ever, and every little detail had some significance.
My god, baseball is a game for (as Brits would say) boffins. Fans of the game could put meth-head ravers to sleep. I’ve worked on more exciting spreadsheets for business planning.
And football has become just as bad, with the incessant pre-game/post-game commentary examining every nuance of a play - “I’m pretty sure if the inner aglet of his left shoe had moved the other way, we’d be talking about a completely different game”.
Bread and circuses, appealing to our base nature. The difference between WWE and “actual” sports on tv is only a matter of degree.
I mean, you see the same kind of thing with scripted television where there’s no kayfabe at all. We recently got the season finale of Daredevil Born Again, and there were all kinds of posts/comments/etc talking about how satisfying/bad ass it was to see Daredevil and Punisher beat down a bunch of cops. We all know it’s scripted fiction, but it’s still fun to watch.
I know professional wrestling is as real as the MCU or the latest episode of Severance. I am still entertained by all three.
Wrestling winds up in the “sports” section because news outlets have to classify it somehow. That’s not the fault of wrestling fans.
There’s really no need in life to yuck other people’s yum. If it’s not for you, that’s cool.
Sports is kind of a stretch. Professional wrestling should be classified as entertainment with the soap operas and marvel slop.
Totally agree but for the opposite reason.
Wrasslin’ is very story driven. Not everyone has time to watch, and the sports news outlets is all spoilers.
It’s like a Harry Potter fan opening their news feed to “Snape kills Dumbledore after epic battle!” plastered all over the news on the day after the book came out. (my apologies to any Harry Potter fans who haven’t read all the books or seen all the movies by now, in 2025).
Put it next to ballet and grab some popcorn.
