WWE: A Major PR Problem After Keeping Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia

The WWE is having Evolution this Sunday. However, they are then set to have another event a few days later. On November 2, the WWE will be holding Crown Jewel. It was set to take place in Saudi Arabia, but with the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, those plans were being talked about. Up until Thursday, there was an uncertainty to where the event was going to be held.

On Thursday, the WWE released their third-quarter earnings. In that press release, they mentioned what the future of Crown Jewel will be. They mentioned that the event will go ahead and be held in Saudi Arabia. The mindset behind the move was that they have built a fan base there and they did sign the ten-year deal.

While they will become very profitable off of the show, the company will end up taking a major PR hit. The PR hit will come in the sense of a few different areas. For starters, they will lose network subscribers. The second the news broke, there was a hashtag that started popping up a lot on Twitter. The hashtag of #cancelthenetwork started when this news initially broke. While it was only a few people who have been using it, there could be a strong chance that more people will end up unsubscribing to the WWE Network.

The Fallout

I also think the product in the ring will be affected. There is already a slew of superstars who don’t want to go. One of them happens to be John Cena. As of this writing, it isn’t sure if John Cena will remain in the World Cup. While the WWE did decide to keep Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia, I think they are regretting the move. If you have been watching Raw or Smackdown as of late, they seem to want to further storylines that have a chapter at Saudi Arabia. I think this is because once the event is over, the WWE doesn’t want to talk or mention the event.

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