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WWE Sells Out Upcoming Premium Live Event in Hours as Popularity Grows Following Vince McMahon Exit
Tim Crean started writing about sports in 2016 and joined Sports7 in 2021. He excels with his versatile coverage of the NFL and soccer landscape, as well as his expertise breaking down sports media, which stems from his many years downloading podcasts before they were even cool and countless hours spent listening to Mike & The Mad Dog and The Dan Patrick Show, among other programs. As a longtime self-professed sports junkie who even played DII lacrosse at LeMoyne College in Syracuse, New York, Tim loves reading about all the latest sports news every day and considers it a dream to write about sports professionally. He's a lifelong Buffalo Bills fan from Western New York who mistakenly thought, back in the early '90s, that his team would be in the Super Bowl every year. He started following European soccer — with a Manchester City focus — in the early 2000s after spending far too much time playing FIFA. When he's not enjoying a round of golf or coaching youth soccer and flag football, Tim likes reading the work of Bill Simmons, Tony Kornheiser, Chuck Klosterman, and Tom Wolfe.
Get to know Tim Crean betterUpdated24 Aug 2022
WWE is on fire under its new management. Vince McMahon retired just over a month ago, and the wrestling promotion — under the control of co-CEOs Stephanie McMahon and Nick Khan and the creative direction of Paul “Triple H” Levesque — is gaining steam at rates not seen since the Attitude Era.
As Triple H continues to surprise and excite fans with WWE's new creative direction, TV ratings are up, and an upcoming Premium Live Event just sold out during its presale in a city that hasn't come out to enthusiastically support WWE in quite a while.
WWE basically sold out Survivor Series in Boston during presale
Survivor Series is one of WWE's tent pole Premium Live Events (formerly pay-per-views). The 2022 version of the event will take place at TD Garden in Boston, Massachusetts, on Saturday, November 26.
Tickets aren't available to the general public yet, but if you haven't got your seat yet, you may be out of luck.
Presale for the event started on Wednesday, August 24. Wrestling Observer Newsletter's Dave Metzler reported that the event “basically sold out during the presale today.” The pro wrestling insider also noted that “Whatever is held back will sellout during the public onsale” and added, “I can't think of a WWE show in years to do that.”
While it's not clear exactly what the capacity is for a WWE show, TD Garden is one of the bigger NBA/NHL arenas with 19,600 seats.
This quick sellout is another positive sign in a recent string of positive signs that WWE's popularity is on its way up.
In addition to the quick sellout, both Monday Night Raw and Friday Night SmackDown TV show ratings are up to right around 2 million viewers per episode in recent weeks, per WrestlingData.com. For the three-hour Raw on USA Network, specifically, this is around a half-a-million-viewers-per-week bump from where the shows were the last year or two.
The Triple H Era is driving popularity
Vince McMahon was at the creative controls of WWE (and WWF before that) for nearly 40 years. He shepherded the company through the ups and downs of the Golden Age, the New Generation, the Attitude Era, Ruthless Aggression, the PG Era, the Reality Era, and the current New Era.
Starting with SummerSlam 2022, though, we are now in the Triple H Era.
So far, the Triple H Era has been much like fans expected after the former wrestler's tenure running NXT during its Black & Gold Era.
There has been a renewed focus on in-ring wrestling and more attention paid to pro wrestling and WWE history. There have also been more slow-building, subtle storylines, as opposed to McMahon's flair for the big, bold, and (at times) cartoonish.
It has also already included a boatload of returns from former NXT stars. This list already includes Dakota Kai, Iyo Sky, Karrion Cross, Scarlett Bordeaux, Hit Row (Top Dolla, Ashante “Thee” Adonis, and B-Fab), Dexter Lumis, and, after last Monday Night Raw, Johnny Gargano.
Tripe H's creative direction isn't all that groundbreaking, but it does feel like a breath of fresh air for a company that the same executive has run for four decades.
And for now, that is driving ticket sales and TV ratings to a whole new level.
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