The actual attendance at WrestleMania 23 was 74,687 fans. This was not a Ford Field record as other events have legitimately held 78,000, but it was a bigger crowd than the 2005 Super Bowl in the same building. Vince McMahon made the call to announce the attendance as 80,103 fans so it would break the stadium record and be an impossible number to match since there simply aren’t enough seats in any configuration to get 80,000. It was the third largest crowd in WWE history, behind WrestleMania III with 78,000 in attendance and SummerSlam 1992, which genuinely held 79,127. The paid attendance was 68,500, again the third largest in company history behind those two same shows. The $5,380,000 gate was a WWE record and the biggest in North American pro-wrestling history, though it fell just short of the $5,397,000 MMA record for Ortiz/Lidell on 30th December 2006.
Cody Rhodes is being pegged for an early 2008 debut on a WWE brand. Management felt he was very articulate, mature for his age and respectful of everyone at the Hall of Fame ceremony. Dusty has been very careful not to forcefully push his son to people backstage.
William Shatner was booed during his induction speech for Jerry Lawler when fans saw he was simply reading the speech, most likely written for him, and had no emotional attachment to the proceedings. By the end he was being booed out of the building with “boring” chants.
Larry Hennig had asked WWE to play “Rap is Crap” rather than the Mr Perfect theme music during Curt’s induction. Sadly, it didn’t happen.
Credit: Wrestling Observer newsletter (click here for subscription information)
