It was not a warm welcome from wrestling fans
WrestleMania 42 is in Las Vegas this weekend — the second straight year the two-night event has taken place in Sin City — and fans are packing Allegiant Stadium.
Fans of professional wrestling. Not off Stephen A. Smith.
It became clear quite quickly.
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The first match, Night 1, was a three-man match between Jimmy Uso, Jey Uso and LA Knight against Logan Paul, Austin Theory and live streamer IShowSpeed. It sounds weird, but it was honestly a far better match than it had any business, ending with IShowSpeed hitting Logan Paul with the same move through the announce table that he dished out to Jelly Roll at Summer Slam.
The crowd was buzzing and before moving on to the next matchup between Drew McIntyre and Jacob Fatu, they showed some celebrities in the crowd like San Francisco 49ers tight end Greg Kittle and Indiana Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton.
Both are large WWE fans and received a standing ovation, especially when Kittle chugged not just his beer, but Haliburton’s as well.
But then they got to Stephen A. and there was a significant mood change…
Thanks to Stephen A. for embracing the heel role. I don’t think he has much of a problem with it though. Just ask any Cowboys fan.
Of course, Stephen A. was probably in the house because this year’s WrestleMania is the first to be streamed by ESPN.
In a rather interesting move, the first few hours of each night will air for free on ESPN (well, not free. You’ll need cable to watch it, but you know what I mean). The hope seems to be that giving a free taste will make people run to their phone, tablet or connected device and sign up for ESPN’s streaming platform to watch the best.
I’m not sure how well that will work, but hey, it’s a tactic that has worked wonders for drug dealers for decades.
