10 WWE Experiments That Completely Failed

It sounds like a pretty good publicity stunt on paper. Step one: you pretend that you've sold your flagship television show to one of the world's most famous businessmen. Step two: ???. Step three: profit.

Only problem was WWE executives neglected to tell shareholders that it was all a work. In consequence, stocks fell by 7%, forcing the company to issue a statement confirming wrestling isn't real and then drop the storyline altogether a week later.

Apart from having to see Trump's face all over the product, it wasn't really all that bad for the fans. Those watching TV got a rare commercial-free episode of Raw, and the lucky few in attendance were even refunded the cost of their tickets.

For WWE, though? If you combine the loss of ad revenue from ditching commercials, the cost of buying everyone a free seat (let's assume that the future POTUS didn't dip into his own pockets here) and the sheer embarrassment of it all, this has to go down as a total, unmitigated disaster.