There was a time, not that long ago even, when Vince McMahon allowed the wants of his audience to dictate the direction of his show. He was a savvy promoter who would constantly take the pulse of the fans and determine which direction he was going to steer the ship based on that feedback. No, seriously, that happened. It appears that philosophy is no more and a stubbornness the likes of which we may have never seen in all of humanity has crept in and taken over. Gone are the days when the reactions of the crowds held any influence over those in charge. It takes an actual audience revolt to change the booking plans in this modern era of professional wrestling. Royal Rumbles 2013 and 2014 are the two most stark examples of this. In 2013 McMahon had his mind made up that Batista was the man to win the rumble and head to WrestleMania as the babyface challenger to Randy Orton's WWE championship. Nevermind the fact that Batista had been getting heel reactions for weeks or that Orton was dying as champion; the fans wanted one man and one man only, and Vince fought with all he had to keep from giving them Daniel Bryan. One year later and the EXACT SAME SITUATION presents itself. Did WWE learn anything from the mistake of the year prior? No, they doubled down and forged ahead with their plan of christening Roman Reigns, which profoundly backfired and stalled any momentum Reigns had. So what changed? I honestly can't answer that. There isn't a successful business on planet Earth where that type of mentality from the brass would be tolerated, let alone encouraged. It would be like Coca-Cola deciding to ignore the massive backlash against New Coke and sticking with the change in formula rather than reverting back to Coke Classic. You know what that would have caused? Bankruptcy.
Brad Hamilton is a writer, musician and marketer/social media manager from Atlanta, Georgia. He's an undefeated freestyle rap battle champion, spends too little time being productive and defines himself as the literary version of Brock Lesnar.
