With the end of the year, there will naturally be a look toward 2026, and a retrospective point of view on how 2025 will mold the future. Truth be told, this year was a key year for the TKO corporation, as the conglomerate debuted on Netflix for the start of a massive $5 billion deal that took the flagship Raw show to a streaming platform, which globalized the product more than ever before. That notion is underscored by the fact that Saudi Arabia bought the Royal Rumble in 2026 and will get Wrestlemania the year after. Sure, the WWE is domestically based, but all bets are off with any type of tradition for where events will be held, as it will simply go to the highest bidder, which is why WM 42 was originally slated to be in New Orleans in April before Las Vegas outbid the city to land the showcase of the immortals for a second year in a row.
Much of that had to do with the business side of the organization, an aspect that is undoubtedly impacted by the creative direction, but the scripting of the shows was also affected by the business deals made, particularly when events where shifted around and thus certain angles were either pushed forward or postponed.
As we head into 2026, you have to wonder, can the office serve all of those masters or will attempting to do so eventually come back to bite them?
From the creative front, the retirement tour of John Cena fueled the company throughout the year, as it should’ve. Despite Roman Reigns taking the top spot in the company through his heel turn during the pandemic, Cena is still biggest star that the company has made in the past two decades. That’s not a knock on any of the other stellar talent, but rather to point out the rare level that Cena obtained and why his retirement justified a year of the WWE calendar. Furthermore, Cena was a major revenue source for the promotion, as his final appearances sold tickets and an incredible amount of merchandise in each city. The sea of color-coded t-shirts, depending on the location, translated to dollar signs throughout the entire final run.
It was a smart business move, even if the story arc of his heel turn fell so flat that he randomly turned back baby face on an episode of Smackdown before he dropped the belt back to Cody Rhodes. Ultimately, that should be the biggest takeaway from the John Cena heel turn, it didn’t truly get over because of how the follow-up was completely fumbled. The fans expected The Rock at WM 41, but they got Travis Scott, who was thankfully also MIA after his cameo appearance. All of this boils down to the fact that not everything that Dwayne Johnson is involved with is gold, the box office numbers for The Smashing Machine are proof of that, and it would be unwise for management to cater to him in 2026 if he popped his head out of Hollywood to try to increase his perceived level of star power to leverage it for a future film role.
Along with that, since Cena turned baby face before he lost the title back to Cody, it almost created somewhat of a plateau in terms of the title picture. Rhodes didn’t slay the corrupt final boss or conquer the former hero that turned his back on the fans to win the championship for the audience, he simply beat the aging gunfighter that was scheduled to retire at the end of the year anyway so it wasn’t a dramatic moment when he won the title back. From there, Cody’s tenure as champion throughout the rest of 2025 was lukewarm at best. Sure, he had solid title matches, including a pair of bouts against Drew McIntyre, but it was very obvious that those were placeholder contests just to give Rhodes an opponent at various times, not a true rivalry where the fate of the belt was in question. Because of that, if management wants to continue to promote Cody as the top guy, which they should, as he checks all of the boxes as a representative for the organization, they are going to have to make a serious effort to get him involved in meaningful angles with credible opponents in 2026. In some ways, there’s almost an unavoidable letdown in these type of scenarios because after Roman ran through everyone for over four years to set up for the memorable Cody victory, there’s simply not many fresh opponents left for him to work with as champion, hence why the Cena turn had so much stream initially, as it gave Cody’s character a purpose in his second year at the top of the card. Maybe other pieces of the puzzle could’ve been shuffled around during the past four or five months to give Cody something more important to do rather than him unintentionally coasting as champion, but it’s a rather moot point now.
As far as the future, we’ve seen recently that the office is wisely positioning Bron Breakker to move up the ranks. I’ve said it before and I will say it again, Breakker has all the tools to be a top guy, and he’s young enough that outside of injury, the promotion could have a top star for at least 15 years. However, and this is a critical piece of that puzzle, how the office books his coronation, including the follow-up, will determine if he can be truly cemented as a main event star. If the writing team attempts to shoehorn him into the spot or rush the storyline that would see him capture the championship, the fan base, especially the casual fans, might not buy it.
Finally, I could be wrong because there’s without a doubt a diehard demographic of WWE fans that would follow the company anywhere at any price, but I honestly believe that the completely outrageous TKO ticket prices will finally catch up to the organization in 2026. Yes, the fans have paid insane prices up until this point, but there are peaks and valleys with anything. The Attitude era eventually came to an end, too. Anyone that doesn’t think that there’s a tipping point for the TKO business model is fooling themselves, even CEO Mark Shapiro, who brashly proclaimed that the corporation can restructure the WWE scale to reflect the prices usually associated with UFC. This shouldn’t be a newsflash, but despite being under the same umbrella, the WWE has a different demographic than the UFC, which is why the ticket prices were traditionally different. More specifically, the notion that the WWE brand can continue to deliver less, with the recent four-match Survivor Series card as an example, at the inflated prices isn’t something that can sustain itself.
Again, I could be wrong, but I sincerely believe that the current TKO business model for the WWE, particularly with the higher cost of pay-per-views on the ESPN app, won’t sustain itself through 2026. At some point, the fan base will pick and choose more cautiously on when they spend money on the WWE product. If the TKO suits wants to continue to have the profitable revenue stream, they will have to adjust the prices to a level that the market can support or there will be a decline in the numbers. Maybe all of this is relatively moot if the current strategy is to attempt to inflate the value of the corporation as much as possible before an eventual WWE sale to Saudi Arabia.
The state of the WWE union for the year should be kept rather simple in terms of how to proceed into a successful 2026. Don’t allow The Rock to dictate the narrative of the organization, we saw how that worked out when he was a no-show for Wrestlemania. Make Cody’s tenure as champion a priority in the creative meetings to keep him at a level of importance, even if he’s scripted to lose the title, as his role as a representative for the company is arguably more important than the championship. There should be an effort to gear the future toward Bron Breakker, with a showdown against Brock Lesnar at Wrestlemania. Finally, the executives shouldn’t make the assumption that slapping the WWE logo on something will continue to sell it at such astronomical prices, as the argument could be made that John Cena’s retirement tour was the only reason that the audience was willing to pay the prices this year.
What do you think? Share your thoughts, opinions, feedback, and anything else that was raised on Twitter @PWMania and Facebook.com/PWMania.
Until next week
-Jim LaMotta
Email [email protected] | You can follow me on Instagram, Facebook, & Threads @jimlamotta89
