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Feed Me More: The Wrestler as a Human Being

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Feed Me More: The Wrestler as a Human Being

Wrestling is a lot like comic books. It has characters and tropes that stick around for decades. It works in the confines of dated rules that would be pointless to break. Most importantly, it has a seemingly never-ending narrative that uses said characters to tell compelling and hyper-stylized stories on a regular schedule.

Unlike comic book characters, however, the wrestlers telling a story in and around the squared circle are real human beings. They act as characters completely separate from their real-world identities, putting their bodies on the line night after night for the advancement of a story and the crowd’s amusement. They experience actual pain, real injuries, and often tragic events.

Unfortunately, wrestlers have little to no support from their respective companies. No major American wrestling promotion actually counts their wrestling roster as employees, but rather treats them as independent contractors. Who wins and who loses in a wrestling match is determined by a select few people, which heavily influences a wrestler’s popularity. A wrestler simply has to work within a backwards and often unfair system where even the most minute discrepancy could break their entire career.

Two bits of news came out yesterday that revealed some unsavory practices by the WWE and the wrestling industry as a whole. Wrestler Ryback vented his frustrations with the WWE and how his consistent losses meant less money to take home, while having zero input on the direction (and win/loss record) of his character. At the same time, recently-suspended WWE wrestler Adam Rose revealed that his 60-day suspension was for a legitimate prescription of Adderall. These two social media posts provided a rare and clearly unsanctioned glimpse into the WWE’s internal politics, while giving fans an explanation for their absence from WWE programming.

Many casual fans, however, seemed surprised by these frank and honest admissions. I, too, only recently learned about certain unfortunate aspects of a wrestler’s life and what one deals with as a contracted but indirectly employed performer. So before you, the wrestling fan, go to the next house show or flip on Smackdown tomorrow night, there are a few things you should know about your favorite grapplers and the company they work for.

Feed Me More: The Wrestler as a Human Being
Curtis Axel and Ryback (right)

Wrestlers are independent contractors.

WWE, TNA, and the like employ non-wrestling personalities, road crew, production staff, and everything in between. They do not, however, have a salaried staff of wrestlers. Instead, the wrestlers are signed on as independent contractors with little to no benefits, including the lack of company-sponsored health insurance. All wrestlers pay for their own health insurance. They also pay for most of their travel and lodging. They even pay taxes in every state they work in. But since they’re in binding, exclusive contracts, they cannot work elsewhere during their employment, and often cannot jump ship to a different wrestling company after termination due to non-compete clauses.

Wrestlers are paid more based on their win/loss record.

The outcome to a wrestling match is predetermined unless there is an incident preventing the outcome from occurring. As Ryback stated in his post, the wrestlers who are picked to lose put in the same amount of work and are subjected to the same, if not more, physical stress as the wrestlers who are chosen to win. While it is not proven (and even disputed) that the winner gets paid more than the loser, it has been continuously stated by WWE wrestlers and industry experts alike that people who win the title belts are given a pay increase. (Whether or not this is an increase for the duration of the title reign or a permanent pay increase is anyone’s guess.) Nonetheless, if the sum of the outcome of one’s matches determine a wrestler’s success in holding a title, and holding a title increases one’s pay, and the matches are chosen by a person or people arbitrarily or based on any number of factors (popularity, merchandise sales, or just because Vince McMahon likes someone), then it can be said that the predetermined win/loss record can, in fact, impact a wrestler’s pay.

Feed Me More: The Wrestler as a Human Being
Disgruntled ex-WWE wrestler CM Punk (right).

Wrestlers often work hurt or injured.

Wrestling might be predetermined and manufactured in a way to prevent injury as much as possible, but injuries do happen. When a wrestler suffers a major injury preventing them from performing, they undergo treatment and/or surgery to repair and rehab from said injury. According to former WWE wrestler CM Punk, however, they’re often asked to jump back on schedule as soon as possible to continue or restart rivalries and storylines, despite not being 100%. Even worse, wrestlers are allegedly asked to compete while sick or with minor injuries, which could further worsen or exacerbate their condition both in the ring and in life. At the same time, many wrestlers have willingly competed in the ring with nagging, unresolved injuries to not lose their place in the spotlight. After all, if a wrestler is in the middle of a storyline and abruptly exits programming, the belief is that they may not have the same opportunity when they return.

Wrestling unions don’t exist because of Hulk Hogan.

In the ’80s, Jesse Ventura attempted to start a wrestling union and give the independent contractors more leverage for pay, benefits, and the like. The attempt was unsuccessful, as wrestlers were reluctant to join. Years later, during legal proceedings after Ventura filed a lawsuit on back pay and royalties, it was revealed in court that Hulk Hogan had informed Vince McMahon about the union attempt at the time, which stopped it from progressing any further for numerous reasons. Since then, WWE was subjected to lawsuits for back pay and failure to provide benefits, which were all dismissed. Had these attempts been successful, wrestlers would likely be entitled to much better treatment.


Though it may appear to be glamorous all the time, wrestlers live an often grueling life. They’re on the road for over 300 days, doing mostly physical work for days, if not weeks straight. Yet no matter how hard they work, they still foot the bill for their travel, meals, health insurances, and other quality of life expenses that you would expect a billion-dollar public company to pay for.

While the aftermath of Ryback’s very public look at his and other wrestlers’ alleged situations will unfold in the coming days and weeks, it’ll be interesting to see how the WWE handles this both on the consumer-facing side (read: television) and through press releases. But it brings up a subject that really needs to be discussed in a public forum: Ryback, the character, is Ryan Reeves, the person, and though he may not be your favorite wrestler, he and his peers should still be privy to non-arbitrary compensation, at the very least.

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