Report Suggests WWE Fans Scared Pat McAfee and Jelly Roll Out of Company

A new report suggests that the WWE fan outcry about the overuse of celebrities in the company has scared Pat McAfee and Jelly Roll from taking part in a planned match next month.

While the Night 2 main event of WrestleMania 42 will go down as a classic, Night 1’s headliner was controversial for many WWE fans. Weeks before the event, sometimes announcer and wrestler Pat McAfee was thrust into the storyline between Undisputed Champion Cody Rhodes and Randy Orton. The random move reportedly came down from TKO CEO Ari Emanuel in an attempt to boost sluggish ticket sales for the two-night event.

McAfee’s surprising addition was loudly panned by WWE fans. However, part of the reason for the backlash was the audience getting exhausted with the company’s overuse of celebrities on the road to WrestleMania 42. Country music star Jelly Roll made a stunning number of appearances in the last month, and rapper Lil Yachty was heavily used over the last couple of weeks.

Pat McAfee succumbs to WWE fan backlash

Credit: WWE

Well, that loud frustration has been heard loud and clear, and it looks like WWE fans won’t be seeing McAfee or Jelly Roll again for a very long time. According to Dave Meltzer of Wrestling Observer, McAfee “opted out” of being a focus of the Night 1 main event and plans for a tag match of Rhodes-Jelly Roll vs. Orton-McAfee at Backlash in May.

“The thing is that both of them were very cognisant of what has been said about celebrities in wrestling,” Meltzer claimed. “Both of them love wrestling, and I think that they realised that there was a lot of negative sentiment about it.”

So if you were among those boisterous fans loudly pushing back on WWE’s overuse of celebrity, the campaign was a success, and the celebs will be gone from the company’s content for a while.