If there was any thought that WWE might “play it safe” at Saturday’s Royal Rumble event following allegations against Vince McMahon coming to light and his subsequent resignation from the TKO board, it didn’t happen.
The Royal Rumble emanated from St. Petersburg’s Tropicana Field, home of MLB’s Tampa Bay Rays. A longtime resident of the Tampa/St. Petersburg area is WWE legend Hulk Hogan.
Hogan has been embroiled in his own scandals, most notably with the leaking of audio that included Hogan using explicitly racist language. After distancing itself from Hogan for a few years, WWE welcomed Hogan back into the fold. That included having Hogan narrate a pre-recorded intro to Saturday’s Royal Rumble event.
The video was shared on Twitter/X by WWE’s Chief Content Officer (and McMahon’s son-in-law), Paul Levesque, FKA Triple H.
Tonight… names will be made, tickets will be punched and legacies will begin.
Allow @HulkHogan to explain what it takes to be ready. RUMBLE ready.#RoyalRumble streams live from @tropicanafield tonight at 8e/5p @peacock @WWENetwork pic.twitter.com/XPQvBNNby7
— Triple H (@TripleH) January 27, 2024
The decision to have Hogan narrate the intro was widely criticized.
After the events of the past two days. The Royal Rumble opening with Hulk Hogan is so unbelievably hilarious.
Audibly laughed
— Narwitz (@SophiaNarwitz) January 28, 2024
Us: "Let's not focus on anyone problematic tonight"
Also Us: "Let's open the show with a Hulk Hogan video package"#RoyalRumble— WWE Creative Humor (a sub of TKO Creative Humor) (@WWECreative_ish) January 28, 2024
Ahh just the person to bring in when you're going through a scandal https://t.co/ZKWDYg3Vk2
— TableofJapan (@TableofJapan) January 27, 2024
One good way to distance yourself from Vince McMahon is to avoid having Hulk Hogan do your intro
— Jason Kirk (buy my novel) (@JasonKirk_fyi) January 28, 2024
Paul!
Buddy!
Look, I know you’re shakin’ in your boots right now, but the last guy we need to be seeing and hearing from is Terry from Clearwater, right? https://t.co/AEthAGAvTH pic.twitter.com/FmUvWBqX4Z— Kevin D. Grüssing (@ Momocon May 26th-30th) (@KevDGrussing) January 27, 2024
Indeed, prominently featuring Hogan is controversial enough. But prominently featuring a person from one scandal just after another scandal came to light is even more questionable.
For the sake of argument, we can cut WWE some slack and assume that this video was made well before the latest allegations against McMahon and the company came to light. That said, there was plenty of time to call an audible once the charges did come to light. If there was ever a time to do that, it was here.
[Triple H on Twitter/X, Photo Credit: Peacock/WWE]
