WWE Rumors: Backstage Vibe Leading Into ‘Stomping Grounds’ Is As Bad As The Mid ’90s
It really doesn’t seem like it, but there is a brand new WWE pay-per-view taking place for the first time ever this Sunday night. Even fans who have been watching the programming every week don’t appear to know much about it, but Stomping Grounds is coming. As things do look really bad for the PPV, the feeling among all of those backstage is that things have become as bad as they were more than 20 years ago.
Stomping Grounds is headlined by a WWE Universal Championship Match between Seth Rollins and Baron Corbin. The other huge bout on the card is a steel-cage match for the WWE Championship between Kofi Kingston and Dolph Ziggler, and that one does have some momentum.
The Inquisitr recently reported that ticket sales were so bad just two weeks out from the event that there were seats available all around the arena. Even as of this writing, Ticketmaster still has a lot of lower-price seats available for purchase, and a sellout is highly doubtful.
With declining ratings almost every single week, low attendance at numerous events, and this PPV which seems like an afterthought, morale has become extremely low. The Twitter account for WrestleVotes has even reported that one WWE source said things are as bad as the mid ’90s and going into an In Your House event.
Texting with a WWE source, who travels with the crew. Said the vibe going into Sunday’s PPV is similar to the vibe around the “In Your House” shows from back in the day. Lack of meaningful matches, low ticket sales and general feeling reminds them of 1995/1996. Yikes.
— WrestleVotes (@WrestleVotes) June 18, 2019
WrestleVotes is a Twitter account that reports a lot of rumors, inside information, and other pieces of speculation. While no one is ever 100 percent accurate, they do end up being rather spot-on about numerous things, and they always cover themselves.
After reporting on the bad vibe backstage in WWE, many Twitter users jumped all over the account for false reporting. While WrestleVotes didn’t offer a retraction, they did want to calm everyone’s nerves a bit.
Relax people. The source I’m referencing is one 99% of you guys have never heard of & wouldn’t recognize if they walked right by you. I don’t think some of you realize how large WWE is. https://t.co/vozooQb2rq
— WrestleVotes (@WrestleVotes) June 18, 2019
The whole thing with Stomping Grounds is that many fans do feel as if it was rushed and the matches don’t have much importance behind them. A lot of them are continuation feuds and rematches from previous events while some others have just been thrown together.
This week alone, with less than seven days until the PPV, WWE has added four matches to simply try and fill out the card. Almost doubling the listed number of matches within days of a big event is never a good sign that there are solid plans in place.
As of Wednesday afternoon (June 19), here is the confirmed card for Stomping Grounds:
- WWE Universal Championship: Seth Rollins (c) vs. Baron Corbin – Special Guest Referee TBA
- WWE Championship – Steel Cage Match: Kofi Kingston (s) vs. Dolph Ziggler
- Raw Women’s Championship: Becky Lynch (c) vs. Lacey Evans
- SmackDown Women’s Championship: Bayley (c) vs. Alexa Bliss
- Roman Reigns vs. Drew McIntyre
- WWE United States Championship: Samoa Joe (c) vs. Ricochet
- WWE Cruiserweight Championship: Tony Nese (c) vs. Akira Tozawa vs. Drew Gulak
- SmackDown Tag Team Championship: Daniel Bryan & Rowan (c) vs. Heavy Machinery
- Big E & Xavier Woods vs. Kevin Owens & Sami Zayn
