Dawn Waters and her son Ryan Riddell love John Cena so much, Waters camped outside a Dundalk Kmart to see him.
The year was 2015, and 13-year-old Riddell was determined to get one of the biggest names in professional wrestling to sign his hat. His mom waited with him in a line that snaked through the department store to meet Cena, known to WWE fans as the Greatest of All Time.
When it was their turn, Ryan regaled the 17-time world champion with tales of all the wrestlers who’d signed the hat before him, like Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Cena must have enjoyed the story, Waters recalled, because he invited the entire Waters family to his match in Baltimore that night.
This month, Waters thought they had an opportunity to see Cena one last time at Capitol One Arena in Washington, D.C. Wrestlers have competed in a tournament for weeks to face Cena in an event dubbed his “Final Match” during Saturday Night’s Main Event before he retires from his 23-year pro wrestling career.
But Waters and Riddell can’t afford to go. Depending on when you look, the cheapest tickets have run from around $240 to $500, more than triple what they paid to attend professional wrestling matches just a few years ago.
Cena’s last match is the latest World Wrestling Entertainment event pricing out its biggest fans. The soaring ticket prices have flustered families who were accustomed to affordable shows they could attend regularly. Now they’re missing the chance to bid goodbye to a wrestling hero or shelling out thousands to experience what they hope will be a meaningful moment.
John Cena made his TV wrestling debut in 2002 and quickly became one of the most recognizable superstars in the business, winning over fans with his “good guy” persona, impressive delivery on the mic and his popular catchphrases like “You can’t see me.”
He went on to a career in Hollywood, appearing in movies like “Daddy’s Home 2″, “F9: The Fast Saga” and “The Suicide Squad.” He’s now starring in the HBO Max TV series “Peacemaker.”
“There’s not going to be another John Cena,” said Brian H. Waters, a wrestling podcast producer and host who lives in Baltimore. He called Cena’s last match a rare opportunity.
“We don’t get to say goodbye to our heroes in pro wrestling. Unfortunately, they phase out. And then they die off,” said Brian Waters, who has no relation to Dawn Waters.
He said the Cena ticket prices are a “travesty.”
Soaring costs
Dawn Waters, 52, has a stack of ticket stubs to commemorate all the WWE shows she’s attended. A 2018 ticket was for $70, a 2011 ticket was for $77 and a 2017 ticket was $83.
Back then, her family could afford floor seats for some of the biggest WWE events of the year. The nearly two dozen folding chairs they sat in are now stacked in her basement closet as memorabilia.
Her family would go to WrestleMania, essentially WWE’s Super Bowl, every year, budgeting the months before to afford travel, hotels and tickets. They had hoped to go again in 2024. The show was in Philadelphia, but the cheapest seats were going for $500 a person when they looked.
“Just the tickets alone was what we paid for to go to New York for a few days or Miami,” Dawn Waters said. “We couldn’t afford to drive to Philadelphia for those tickets, even in the nosebleed seats.”
Dawn Waters said a friend tried selling his Cena tickets to her. Two tickets would cost $1,080, he texted.
“Dayummm,” she responded.
The price hikes follow an ownership change at WWE, which for decades was run by controversial founder Vince McMahon. TKO Group Holdings, which also owns the mixed martial arts promotion UFC, merged with the company that owned WWE in September 2023.
“Vince McMahon was primarily pricing tickets for families and wasn’t totally focused on maxing the opportunity there,” TKO COO Mark Shapiro said in a September Sports Illustrated article.
He said TKO is replicating UFC ticket pricing for WWE shows. Tickets for a Dec. 6 UFC fight in Las Vegas ranged from $106 to $3,700.
WWE and TKO did not return a request for comment.
Linda Loubert, an economics professor at Morgan State University, said fans often don’t think about the extra costs associated with an immersive entertaining experience, like broadcasting, labor and equipment.
The WWE, she noted, has also expanded to international live shows in places like Australia, Saudi Arabia and European countries — another expense. Then there’s inflation to consider, she said, as well as the profit owners are looking to turn.
“It’s about making money,” she said. “We can’t get away from that.”
Tara Meyer, director of operations for MCW Pro Wrestling, Maryland’s largest independent wrestling promotion, said she used to pay $20 for a WWE house show, a smaller-scale event that wasn’t televised.
The next WWE house show in Baltimore is Dec. 26. Tickets recently ranged from $60 to $1,976 on Event Tickets Center.
“I’ve never felt like wrestling wasn’t accessible,” she said. That’s changed.
Before prices were announced, Meyer’s sons, aged 15 and 21, planned to combine the Christmas money their grandparents send every year to buy Cena tickets. They budgeted $250 to $300 apiece.
When Meyer entered the Ticketmaster queue on their behalf with 60,000 others preparing to purchase seats, tickets started at $350.
By the time it was Meyer’s turn to buy, the cheapest ticket they saw was $500.
“Ultimately, they were just like ‘I’m not spending that,’” she said.
The good news, Meyer noted, is that independent wrestling can benefit from this. Wrestling fans would only have to spend $25 to see an MCW show, and a good seat isn’t hard to find.
She said she’d love to see Cena’s last match, “but I’m not selling my soul to go.”
‘Never give up’
Other fans are steeling themselves to pay the painfully high prices to see their hero.
Nicole Williams of Colonial Beach, Virginia, has watched WWE since she was 7. The 33-year-old was born with cerebral palsy and watched wrestling to escape from the disability she was battling.
When Cena debuted, 9-year-old Williams was hooked. His good looks played a part, but it was his “never give up” mantra that she connected with.
“John Cena is there in the ring not giving up on some of the hardest people that he’s fighting, and I don’t want to give up because he’s not,” she said.
Throughout her childhood, Williams’ dad would take her to live shows and meet and greets where she could see the wrestler in person. When she was briefly in a wheelchair, her dad bought front-row accessible seating tickets. Back then, those seats cost between $350 to $425, she said.
“If I were to try to get the same tickets now, it was going to be thousands,” she said about Cena’s last match. “And it really broke my heart.”
She wanted to be in D.C. to see him, the same place she saw him live growing up. She has kids of her own now, and her 6-year-old son has also taken a liking to wrestling. Williams wanted to share that moment with him.
To her surprise, her dad bought them tickets. Both of them experienced medical issues this year, and it will probably be the last time they’ll get to go to a show together, Williams said.
The seats aren’t on the floor, but the price was still well over $1,000.
“Had my dad not been so awesome to take me to this, I would have never been able to even go myself, let alone take my son,” she said.
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