WWE And AEW Igniting Pro Wrestling Boom Period

WWE World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins believes the company is in a boom period—and he’s absolutely right.

Rollins recently told TMZ Sports (h/t Wrestling Headlines) that this is a “special time” for WWE: “Business is hot right now. We’re in a boom, I think. When we look back on it, it’s going to be a special time.”

Indeed, it’s a great time to be a fan of not just WWE but pro wrestling in general. WWE’s business is booming, and in more ways than one.

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Just a few months removed from its “most successful” WrestleMania ever, WWE is hitting heights not reached since the Attitude Era. The Wrestling Observer’s Dave Meltzer (h/t WrestlingNews.co) recently shed some light on the viewership, attendance and merchandising success WWE has had in 2023: “Attendance is way way up….It’s been big on cable…even in the Attitude Era, when it was big on cable, it wasn’t beating the top network shows. It wasn’t even close. But now, I mean, it is. It’s crazy, and people wanna say that somehow this isn’t hot. It is so hot. It’s the hottest wrestling has been since 2001, that’s 22 years.”

Meltzer added, “They certainly weren’t doing these crowds on a regular basis like they are now. The crowds for the quarter would be some of the highest in many years, and so many other things when you look at them. Merchandise has never been higher, ever. Not in the Attitude Era, not in the Hulk Hogan era. Never as high as it is now.”

Poised to land a massive new TV deal later this year, WWE isn’t doing it alone, either. The spirit of competition with its closest competitor AEW remains, as AEW Dynamite and WWE NXT have recently reignited its weekly ratings war. As AEW has expanded its TV schedule with the debut of its CM Punk-led Saturday show Collision, the additional internal competition in AEW has led to more compelling storylines across both Collision and Dynamite.

Like WWE, AEW is also expected to break the bank with a lucrative new TV rights contract later this year, one that will ensure that AEW remains a viable WWE alternative for the foreseeable future. The result? The continuation of a boom period that has made pro wrestling more entertaining and more compelling than it has been in two decades.

Catapulted by the greatness of Roman Reigns and The Bloodline—as well as top stars like Rollins, Becky Lynch and the needle-moving Cody Rhodes—it’s difficult to pinpoint a time in recent memory when WWE was as red hot as it is now. A lot of WWE’s recent success can be attributed to its ability to break out of the pro wrestling bubble and become more mainstream.

WWE’s mutually beneficial relationships with global superstars like Bad Bunny and Logan Paul have helped the company make its mark beyond the squared circle. Especially over the past several years, WWE has evolved far beyond just scripted fighting. It’s a bona fide entertainment juggernaut—so much so that cities are now making huge bids just to land a WWE pay-per-view event.

The company’s success both in the US and overseas for events like Money in the Bank and last year’s Clash at the Castle are just a couple of numerous reasons why when WWE announces its Q2 2023 earnings next month, it’s likely going to smash records once again. That’s what happens when WWE consistently puts on a quality TV product, eh?

Driving by enthralling storytelling with stars like the widely-praised Judgment Day, WWE has managed to turn both Raw and SmackDown into unquestioned viewership successes at a time when the product is typically in a post-WrestleMania down period. While AEW hasn’t fared as well throughout 2023, its recent uptick in quality shouldn’t go noticed.

As a potential free agent bidding war between AEW and WWE looms, pro wrestling fans stand to benefit from it just as much as the wrestlers themselves, who figure to use the possibility of jumping ship as leverage in negotiating substantially better contracts when their current deals expire. That should result in those stars, whether from AEW or WWE, getting significant interest from both sides and, as a result, receiving a push to entice them to stay.

Ideally, that will continue pro wrestling’s hot streak, where stars are breaking out, stories are high-quality and the pro wrestling business is better off because of it.