Concern over Omicron Variant making return to Daily’s Place (AEW) and the ThunderDome (WWE) seemingly imminent

Despite the fact that President Biden claimed recently that “this isn’t March of 2020,” the overwhelming rise in cases of the Omicron variant has gotten many concerned. Just in Montréal, Quebec, the numbers have reached over 4,000 plus cases in a single day. And those numbers are growing….

Of course president Biden and his staff are only trying to keep the mounting panic felt by most at bay, but the severity of this situation is starting to sink in for one and all…we all very well may be headed back into severe lockdown.

The numbers in Quebec are growing so much, that some businesses were forced to close once again and certain businesses were forced to operate at a mere 50% capacity. Furthermore, fans were turned away from a Montréal Canadiens hockey game the other night and the NHL has officially paused the season due to all of this.

And this is happening across the board—even in the US. Dr. J. Kevin Croston, the CEO of North Memorial Health in Minneapolis, said, referring to the reported 200-400 people recently in that facility’s ER:

“That’s the highest number ever. We’re at that point in time where there’s so much death they don’t build hospital morgues to handle situations like this. I am terrified right now. It’s hard for me to fathom having to care for more than we already are currently,”

via NBC

Hospitals and staff are severely overwhelmed right now, and this variant is spreading like wildfire, and despite early reports that this variant was less harmful, that narrative is quickly changing, as has been recently reported, deaths are now being reported due to the variant specifically.

In Canada, restrictions are being enforced big time and there are updates being made to said restrictions daily, as the Federal Government is extremely worried about the aggravating situation.

And so what does this mean for pro wrestling?

Both AEW and WWE returned to their respective tours in full force much earlier this year after being constrained to the limited platforms they had to produce their shows during the earlier portion of the pandemic, and what started as promising tours for both companies are likely now in danger of being canceled.

According to Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer, both companies are prepared for worst case scenarios, which would be a return to a closed-off area where the respective shows can be produced without the risk of infection or spreading the variant themselves. He said:

“I think they’re both going to be pretty confident that Florida will not issue any mandates under any circumstance. Obviously, AEW can go back to Jacksonville and WWE can go back to someplace in Florida. You can always do the Performance Center.

The problem is that if you put Raw and SmackDown in front of 300 people again, those numbers will crater. So, it’s a bad situation, and AEW’s numbers will hurt too. I don’t know if they’ll crater as well, they did okay numbers in Jacksonville. Obviously, if there’s no other choice, then yeah, we can go through that again.

The ThunderDome thing, I mean they did better in the ThunderDome than the Performance Center, so I think that in that sense WWE could look at a ThunderDome again and try to take residency in a building, but it’s hard because I guess you could do the baseball stadium, because baseball isn’t starting for months, so I guess they’ll go to the Tampa baseball stadium and set up.”

via Dave Meltzer /Whatculture.com (Transcription)

Of course everything is still up in the air, and as far as WWE’s show set for Laval, Quebec on the 30^th of December, it’s still on for right now. Things will likely change if this thing gets out of control any more than it already has. We’ll keep you posted, dear readers. Until then, stay safe out there.

NEXT: Jim Ross and Matt Hardy on Jeff Hardy coming to AEW