Fans in attendance at Monday Night Raw got to participate in something special when a joke about the SuperSonics leaving Seattle turned into one of the most intense crowd reactions in WWE history.
This WWE superstar’s joke about the SuperSonics leaving Seattle got one of the biggest boos of all time
Whoa ...
James Dator has been covering a wide range of sports for SB Nation for over a decade, with a special focus on the NFL.
Elias, whose gimmick is that of a music-playing drifter who is a self-professed “guitar playing, trash saying” superstar, riled up fans at KeyArena by saying that having a basketball team in Seattle “doesn’t make sense,” as part of a promo along with fellow heel (bad guy) Kevin Owens.
What ensued was almost five minutes of ceaseless booing, with Elias left to sit in the middle of the ring and soak it all in. He managed to hit the biggest nerve possible as Seattle sports fans hope the NBA will return to the city following a new arena agreement, which was signed in December 2017.
Still, it’s a sore topic, especially as die-hard Sonics fans watch each year as the Thunder compete in the playoffs and Kevin Durant is helping lead the Warriors to NBA titles. Meanwhile Elias can be happy that he is now on top of the mountain for getting one of the biggest reactions of all time.
Tommy Messano of Cageside Seats explained just how momentous the reaction was:
“When ranking pro wrestling crowd reactions you have that Road Warrior pop, Stone Cold Steve Austin’s theme music hitting the night Mick Foley beat The Rock for the WWE title on Raw, and you can now add the night Elias brought up the SuperSonics leaving Seattle to the scale.”
