On SmackDown last Friday, WWE announced a historic sponsorship deal for the company.
It was revealed that Prime Hydration, which was founded by Logan Paul and KSI in 2022, has entered into a partnership with WWE. It's the largest sponsorship deal in WWE's history. As part of the agreement, the Prime logo will be featured on the center of the mat for WWE premium live events starting with WrestleMania 40.
This is the first time that WWE has sold ad space in the center of the ring. Paul and KSI were at SmackDown last week to announce the deal. After the announcement was made, it drew criticism online from fans, including memes of the Prime bottle logo ruining classic moments from WWE history.
Paul responded to the backlash on the latest episode of his Impaulsive podcast. Paul acknowledged the criticism but stated that, whether it was Prime or another company, WWE's parent company TKO Group Holdings was going to sell that ad space.
Paul said the announcement was one of the coolest moments that he and KSI have ever had:
One of the coolest moments of our life, you know. Major achievement, major milestone for our brand and the company. Getting that center ring spot is interesting. It's getting...it's more positive reviews, but I think the diehard wrestling fans are like -- they're really upset, man.
It's never been done, and Vince [McMahon] was always really protective of the mat and not putting any brands on it. But in this new era, which it is, no matter how you cut it, TKO is a publicly traded company, they got to meet a bottom line. That spot was going to be sold. We saw an opportunity, and potentially an opportunity to make people hate me even more, because I am a heel. And that's kind of the angle I took. I was like, 'F*ck y'all. I'm going to stamp everything about this with me so you're reminded of just what my aim is: to take over in this company.'
Paul said he believes that fans will get used to the advertisement over time:
If we don't have this spot forever, which who knows what will happen, it'll be someone else. And I promise you, if you're a diehard WWE fan, you'll forget about it. It'll start to just be standard practice and I don't think it's going to be as distracting as y'all think.
Paul laughed about the memes people have made, saying he thinks they're incredible.
Ahead of WrestleMania 40, Paul has been feuding with Randy Orton and Kevin Owens in WWE. Paul currently holds the United States title.
Prime now has sponsorship deals with both WWE and UFC. Prime became a UFC sponsor in January 2023.
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