Vince McMahon’s Power
An editorial look at Vince in the face of his own downfall.
(photo courtesy of WWE.com)
What the fuck is Vince gonna do tonight?
In some form or fashion, that’s what any fan of professional wrestling was thinking watching the opening of Smackdown on June 17, 2022. Would it be Mr. McMahon, in all his Mr. McMahon glory, ruthlessly and aggressively not apologizing for his alleged wrongdoing? Would he try to spark another Vince vs. Steph feud? Would his limo blow-up? Or would he acknowledge his stepping down as CEO and Chairman and the independent investigation like a regular Homo sapien might? That’s the thing with Vince—literally anything is conceivable because he’s capable of anything. Which is also his greatest weakness—his unyielding self-belief that he can do anything.
These last three days were amongst the most shocking in WWE history, comparable only to the murders of the Benoit family and its aftermath played out in the media. Wednesday the Wall Street Journal created national headlines by the scandal’s revelations. By Friday morning the news hit that Vince was stepping down and Stephanie McMahon would return from familial leave to assume his duties (except creative, he won’t give that up, lucky us). And Friday afternoon it was released by WWE’s PR “Mr. McMahon” would be appearing on Smackdown.
The entirety of the segment lasted what, 45 seconds. Vince strutted down the aisle like he would as a face(?) version of Mr. McMahon, reiterated the tagline of WWE’s signature was, “Then. Now. Forever. Together.” Welcomed us to Smackdown and flipped the mic to leave. Again, his identifying trait and greatest weakness—the belief he can do anything.
Well, he can’t.
He just fucking can’t act like a measured, responsible, contrite, socially acceptable leader. Everything he did was a compulsion to have it both ways. A plea for WWE to be a vessel for unity, while dog-whistling that he’s not really going away. That whole, “Then Now Together Forever” bit suggest timeliness—and, this is not a shot, it’s an observation any rational person with ocular activity would surmise—Vince looked like looming death. The whole thing was what Vince has become over the last, who knows, give or take decade—not just weird but weird, weird.
There’s a part of you that’s sad to see him like this. Sad to see him in this situation, beyond disgust and disappointment. Even knowing his reputation as a ruthless businessman, Vince does have this incredible gift where you root for him, while not knowing exactly why you’re rooting for him.
Maybe it’s whatever memory he produced for television that’s so fondly part of your youth—Hulk Hogan slamming Andre the Giant or “Stone Cold” Steve Austin stunning The Rock at WrestleMania. Maybe it’s the evolution of WWE to stream pretty much all of North American wrestling history with the ease of its WWE Network. Maybe it’s the mythic, pulling-himself-up-by-his-bootstraps escape from a traumatic, genuinely Hellish childhood into a billionaire that you can’t help but begrudgingly admire the guy.
Vince cuts an amusing figure, just from the folklore tall-ish tales about his personality alone. Like his friend and Battle of the Billionaires co-headliner, Donald Trump, literally any anecdote you hear about him seems entirely capable of being true. Vince’s deep hatred of sneezing. Shaving his face multiple times a day with an electric razor. Calling everyone “pal.” Being the real-life inspiration for the Million Dollar Man gimmick. His amusement from farts. Unaware the food he ate for lunch every day for years was called a burrito. Running a production facility that is legit the envy of most major television sports departments whilst being unfamiliar with what a mute button is. Sleeping only 4 hours a night. Thinking the XFL was a viable business—for the second time! Twirling the neck brace he wore in court over his head like a lasso after being exonerated of criminal conspiracy to distribute steroids.
Not so amusing are the things he’s accused of doing. If you’re reading this article on this website, let’s assume you already know the details. Any other large publicly traded company would have pushed him out for having a sexual relationship with a subordinate alone, regardless of how much influence and voting power his stock affords him. Even if, Vince’s attorney Jerry McDevitt claimed in a letter to the Wall Street Journal, that the relationship was consensual, that too is debatable, if not outright false. The power dynamic Vince has over this unknown employee is not consensual—the reporting structure (even if indirect reporting) makes something as innocuous as Vince’s conversational asks seem like demands. I’m not trying to put thoughts in this woman’s head, or intentions in Vince’s, but at the end of the day, if she’s in WWE, he had control over her livelihood, and she had no say in determining the livelihood of Vince. The power goes one way. Any human resources professional or modern workplace would say this was very wrong and ought to be cause for Vince to permanently step away from his duties.
Now, if the allegation from the anonymous “friend” that ignited this investigation that this employee was initially paid $100,000 but was given a 100% salary increase to $200,000 after consummating their affair is true, there’s no way Vince survives this. No matter how voting power his Class B shares provide him, Vince will not return as the Chairman and CEO. In the same letter to the WSJ, McDevitt said, “the WWE did not pay any monies” to the ex-employee on “her departure.” Keyword being departure. The third party legal firm investigating the claim could easily repudiate that statement, and boy, wouldn’t the SEC and stockholders disagree, too. There's no necessities to dance around it—that’s investor money paying for Vince fucking the help. If that is alleged to be true, Vince could see himself in a whole legal entrapment, especially if, allegedly, there are other misconduct claims and NDAs that come to light. Just as a result of this story hitting the press, fair or not, alleged or factual, Vince and the WWE could be targets for all manner of lawsuits.
If I was an employee there, and that allegation is true that a peer received a 100% raise after having sex with a senior executive, I sure as hell wouldn’t work there anymore. And any rational person would dissect promotions and how something as mundane as reporting structure and sub-teams were decided. If that allegation was true, the culture of the company would be decimated, no matter how well the company stock is or isn’t doing in the aftermath.
Who knows what’s next. It would clearly be pure speculation to say what the firm of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP firm may find about WWE’s compliance and human resources departments. I also won’t speculate here how this impacts AEW or the wrestling industry at large. But if it’s as explosive as it may be, then Vince will have to, as he stated in the WWE press release Friday, “accept the findings and outcome of the investigation, whatever they are.”
It’s hard to imagine what Vince would do nearing his 80s, cast out from the impenetrable bubble he built for himself. When faced with serving time in the 1990s—this being an obvious fictional, alternative timeline—I could always see Vince reinventing himself as a pitchman doing infomercials. He would have became a rich man all over again. Because the power that Vince always knew he had was that he was the consummate television performer. His charisma, his bombastic voice, the laughable highfalutin vocabulary, his presence, his drive to do what ever it took to convey an idea, made him one of the best television personalities of all time. Note that I’m not prefacing that statement with, “in wrestling.” I really do think Vince as the blowhard announcer to Vince as the evil executive Mr. McMahon was one of the most mesmerizing acts in the history of the medium. He was just that goddamn good.
For all that we know about Vince that’s good and bad, it’ll be sad to see him canceled if that’s the way things play out. You wonder then, based on what may or may not surface, what would be erased from the library WWE broadcasts. Vince was always so electric in all that he did on television that I wouldn’t want to see that edited out as a corporate edict, but again, based on what may or may not come out, there is a chance that his wrongdoing was so gross that maybe I won’t want to see him again. Going to an art school, one of my admitted blinders is that I’m able to separate the art from the artist. I can still appreciate the Mona Lisa while knowing DaVinci was suggested to have pedophiliac leanings. In my mind, it’s not condoning anything, but I’ll still hit the dance floor when “Billie Jean” comes on. Perhaps part of that is owed to my generation, to puritanical overreaches from all angles in the culture wars, to my male privilege.
More will be written, more will come to light. We know this cycle. We know that, right or wrong, because a massively powerful figure is vulnerable, people with grievances, legitimate or not, will surface and make accusations, some true, some not, and history will replay itself somewhat like it did in the 90s. Except this time, literally billions are at stake, and Vince has less time left in life to reinvent and shape his own destiny.
But Jesus, it’s Vince. Just wait. He’ll end up making billions re-launching the WBF in Saudi Arabia.
(photo courtesy of WWE.com)
