One of the highlights of Wrestlemania 41 this weekend in Las Vegas came in the Saturday night main event as longtime pro wrestling manager and creative Paul Heyman turn on his clients and real-life friends Roman Reigns and CM Punk to help Seth Rollins pull of a surprise win.
Playing up the angle Monday on The Pat McAfee Show, Heyman appeared to explain his sudden turn against Reigns and Punk. As Heyman told it, he was tired of Reigns “using” him and Punk’s constant off-screen antics.
But the pro wrestling fallout turned real when Heyman made a sudden reference to the news of the day at ESPN. Piling dirt on Punk, Heyman said the wrestler was damaging his reputation as manager as much as Shannon Sharpe was damaging ESPN’s reputation.
“Roman Reigns uses everyone in his sight, squeezes the juice out of the fruit until it’s not useful anymore, and then discards them, like he did to me,” Heyman said. “CM Punk does as much good to my reputation as Shannon Sharpe does to ESPN’s.”
Some may not have fully understood the reference, given that sexual assault allegations against Sharpe came to light earlier Monday in a lawsuit by a woman claiming to be Sharpe’s former partner. The woman alleges in the lawsuit that Sharpe recorded himself being intimate with her against her will and forcibly had sex with her.
Much of the crowd at WWE World in Las Vegas did boo, however. And coming off a massive WrestleMania 41, Heyman threw it right back in their faces, refusing to play nice just because he was on ESPN airwaves with McAfee.
“Don’t ‘ooooh’ me, I’m not the one getting sued,” he barked at the crowd.
ESPN has become more involved with WWE since UFC merged with the pro wrestling company and since ESPN licensed The Pat McAfee Show. This is the rub of that embrace.
It may be a work for the cameras, but when a man like Heyman has an angle to build, ESPN’s internal politics do not matter. Rather than keeping the lawsuit quiet and allowing Disney’s corporate policy and legal proceedings to play out, Heyman brought the issue straight to the forefront — live on the network.