#2 – Chicago, Illinois
Historically seen as one of the powerhouses of wrestling cities, it is no surprise to see Chicago at #2. It has hosted a record number of 4 PPV’s since 2015, including Extreme Rules ’15, Payback ’16, Backlash ’17, and Money In The Bank ’18. On top of that there have been 6 RAW shows and 2 Smackdown shows, for a total of 12 televised WWE shows and 139,000+ attendees. Seth Rollins defended his title against Randy Orton at Extreme Rules 2015. John Cena had an excellent match with Cesaro at a 2015 RAW, defending his United States Title. Roman Reigns defended the WWE Championship against AJ Styles at Payback 2016. WWE Smackdown held a special “Wild Card Finals” episode in December of 2016 where all titles were defended (American Alpha became new tag champs). Jinder Mahal shocked the world and won the WWE Championship at Backlash in 2017 from Randy Orton. On Christmas 2017, Jason Jordan would win another tag title in Chicago, this time with Seth Rollins over The Bar. Most recently, Braun Strowman & Alexa Bliss won MITB contracts in June and Bliss would cash in that same night to become champion again. Chicago will host RAW on October 8th, 2018.
#1 – Brooklyn, New York (New York City)
The Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn has become the new premiere spot for WWE to showcase its talent. They have now hosted 3 consecutive Summerslam PPV’s and will make it a 4th later this month. On top of that, there have been 7 RAW shows and 2 Smackdown shows, making a grand total of 12 televised shows with an attendance of almost 175,000 people. Seth Rollins combined the US & WWE Titles in 2015 with The Undertaker defeating Brock Lesnar later that night. The following year, Finn Balor would become the initial Universal Champion, AJ Styles would defeat John Cena in one of the best matches of the year, and Brock Lesnar returned to the main event with a TKO victory over Randy Orton. Stephanie McMahon would fire RAW GM Mick Foley in March of 2017 and Undertaker would close the show in a stare down with Roman Reigns. 2017’s Summerslam featured Brock Lesnar retaining his Universal Championship in yet another main event contest. Recently, Brooklyn hosted the 25th anniversary show for RAW which saw The Miz win back the Intercontinental Championship from Roman Reigns with numerous legend cameos. This is reportedly the last year for a while that Summerslam will be in Brooklyn, so it will be interesting to see if lower tiered PPV’s come to Brooklyn or if another city begins working up the ranks to overtake Brooklyn.
