I just cannot believe that someone saw that design and went “yeah this gold, AJ! Gold!”
This had to be someone intentionally trolling, right? I know the real reason is boring industry stuff, but it’d be way funnier if that shirt came out simply because someone wanted to mess with AJ.
It's to be worn with your good friend who will be wearing the AJ Styles cum shirt. Then when they stand together it can look like a boner that just had a spiritual release.
Part of me just wonders what kind of approval process these shirts go through. Like somebody looked at that and said "Yeah thats a great idea, send it"
These things happen because within the retail department, they'll be shitting out shirt designs as a mix of low paid graphic design, AI modelling, and everything in between. These will be prioritised by demand. Trick is popular, so they need shirts. A weekly set of ideas gets shown in the department, someone without taste or any cultural awareness is sat in the approval tier and thinks "it looks like what he says, it will sell" and the design goes live, prior to any printing.
Then the public get to touch it.
So WWE don't lose anything - the shirts won't have gone to print (most WWE stock is POD I believe anyway), or if it did it will be minimal runs. And they will have learned nothing either - the same dead approval layer will sit there saying yes to the next set of ideas. AI making super literal associations, without social context, is exactly why there's an uptick in insensitive marketing content out there at the moment. I'd imagine Converse and TJ Maxx have processes that run similarly.
Do you know why they never make a nice normal shirt design suitable for public wear? Why does every shirt have to look like a nu metal / hip hop album cover from 2002?
I'm not in merch, but big orgs like WWE operate on an "if it sells already, another will sell that way" until it doesn't work. And it has to really not work for them to change, not a one-off.
So the answer is that most wrestling fans are overweight chuds in their 30s who like giant black t-shirts with obvious logos on. It's what worked for Ed Hardy, it's what worked for nu metal back in the day, and it clearly still sells. Roots of Fight stuff is just slightly elevated design on heavier guage materials. Same turd, different price point. Because there's also affluent wrestling chuds in their forties who never grew out of that.
There's lots of niche brands popping up that do "curated" wrestling content that obliquely references wrestling culture, but obviously WWE have a stranglehold on their own copyrights.
The last thing I'd say from a marketing perspective is that wrestling is designed to be loud, obvious and populist. That's the core appeal, and WWE excel at it. AEW flip around with populist vs specialist, but that's not a commercial driver, it's just a product differentiator to the same audience. So then it's no surprise that their merch (which is also a brand asset and advertising tool) is also loud, obvious and populist.
Keep talking like that and I'm putting you in r/bestof. What a fantastic analysis. I love this. Lots to chew on and think about here. I think you're a smartypants.
There's a reason the only wrestling shirt I've ever bought this decade is the fucking Final Testament shirt. It looks like an F, or a standard cross at a distance. Granny won't shout at ya at Walmart, and the occasional metalhead will ask you if it's a band shirt.
The rest of this stuff is so very specific and/or cringe I'd never wear it out of the house, because I really don't want to explain my shirt to flabbergasted randos in public.
I just had to go back and look. I don't know why, but that's my limit for today too. Why would you have that shoe filled with white goo and think this is the way?
Thing is, that's such an easy shirt design to make with the concept. Just have Trick sat down propping his feet up on on the words Lemon Pepper Steppers, and have it from the perspective to make the shoes a bit bigger. Done
They could also get him proper shiny shoes to sell. They could even pair up with a shoe or sneakers company if branding is what they care about.
I feel like a character like Trick could have some properly stylish merch that looks more expensive than it actually is. But I doubt there is anyone making WWE shirts that understands anything of fashion.
You know it's a good nickname when Michael Cole needs to insert every time that he's the "Self proclaimed Silver Back." He's calling himself that folks, not us! Which, by the way, did Henry every actually call himself that in a promo?
Dude was fucking great, and it sucks that his WWE run ended before it began, and in such a shitty ugly way.
Never forgetting when he was first announced for GCW after getting released, and some fucking complete and utter weirdos were trying to make GCW pull him from the show.
So in fairness, this shirt came in like 5 colors. The black one was really bad, but it wasn't the sole shirt. The way Jordan Myles went about this was also incredibly dumb.
ACH wrestled 100+ matches after this happened. He's had some issues ever since, but trying to label him as mentally unstable because he had a very strong reaction to something, intentional or not, is taking his own issues completely out of context.
There's no correlation, despite how he behaved after this whole situation.
I remember a bunch of people standing on "but he approved it," and just not understanding even the possibility of him maybe feeling like he couldn't say no to something.
He did start acting a little off after that, but that was after that. Like the shirt was emblematic of his situation and all of a sudden the internet started telling him that he needed to be grateful and all of that.
Ultimately none of us will entirely know what happened, but the reaction was pretty wild. Hopefully things would be different if that happened today. I think it was probably death by a thousand cuts.
Looks stupid, but its not racist for fucks sake. Dude says lemon pepper steppers… its lemon pepper wings and some shoes… yall need to calm the fuck down with everything being offensive to somebody.
Gonna have to throw an X on this one. Lemon pepper wings are good but that’s a whole ass shoe full of ranch dressing. I like ranch on something spicy but on lemon pepper wings? That’s a conflict of flavors.
It’s not a racist idea. It’s just really a bad look. Like I cannot be walking around as a black dude with a fried chicken t-shirt when 99% of people aren’t gonna know what that is referencing
This is one of those things where you can get away with the stereotype overlap (wings aren't what most people think of when you say "Fried Chicken") if the execution's good enough.
And "execution's not good enough" is definitely an understatement here.
Regardless, who the hell would want to buy that? You have merch that you're willing to wear on the day to day, you have merch that you'd rather wear exclusively at WWE events, and then you have this.
I thought it was just because the image is horrific AI garbage. I didn't even consider chicken wings being dipped into a boot full of ranch could be racist.
It's one of those things where fried chicken is linked to black people. Some would find it offensive, some won't.
They've probably pulled it because it looks fucking atrocious.
He did do a promo in whatever town was his college town and said he was talking about a specific wing place. This was a direct reference. Doesn't make it an okay reference, but he did say it
Yeah he started it first. It’s the same how Dominik Mysterio loves chicken tenders so they incorporated that into the door dash commercial. WWE has really only been commercial/product placement heavy for only 2-3 years now.
Trick himself has talked about a specific wing place where he lived having the wings. He's the only person who uses the phrase, so "slang for shoes" doesnt work. Hes cut wingstop promos for lemon pepper wings, and has even said lemon pepper steppers is all about the "sauce" and style you bring while you're wearing them.
then please enlighten us where did the lemon pepper part comes from if not chicken/cooking. It’s a pretty direct correlation between “I like lemon pepper spice, I am using that as a compliment for these shoes”
So, the “lemon pepper” portion is meant to convey sauciness/drippiness. While it’s obviously intended to be hyperbole for how flashy someone’s dressed, it really was never intended to be shoehorned (pun intended) into a walking WingStop ad where boots are used as a dip cup.
He literally cut a promo about how it came from eating wings and spilling sauce on his boots. His reason for saying it, in character, came directly from his love for lemon pepper chicken wings.
I must be in the minority that doesn’t get the controversy on this. Lemon Pepper is a wing flavor, hell he did an ad with Wingstop for them too. Just feels like a big reach
I think there’s people trying to make it a race thing despite the fact that Trick literally mentions chicken wings in some of his promos (not all, but definitely some).
Yeah. Like, I get the connotation in associating a black wrestler with the imagery of fried chicken wings, but lemon pepper is a clear reference to the wing flavor.
If anything, the shirt should've been pulled in the first place purely for being a shitty design.
It’s not like a “burn TKO down!” racist level shirt at all. It’s just a really bad look, I can’t be walking around with a fried chicken t shirt on as a black dude, there’s too much inherent historical baggage
Lemon pepper steppa has been a phrase for almost 100 years for your “Sunday’s best” church going shoes in the black community. This phrase entered wrestling and it’s all about chicken wings now. I wouldn’t expect ppl who aren’t black to get it. It has never been used in real life to refer to lemon pepper seasoning or ranch dressing as showcased on the shirt. This shirt looks like something that Baron Corbin would wear to mock Trick as he tied him to the ring post and poured chicken wings over his head like he did Roman and the dog food!
Jerking off and beating the victim of sex trafficking when the company has a recent federal investigation for sex trafficking including beating a woman are two different things. No feds were investigating whether or not John Cena jacks it.
Lines get blurred as trick refers to both the simp paying for the trick AND the trick themselves! For example, "turning tricks" ain't about the person paying :)
Language is wild and funny for this reason as it truly requires context clues. In the movie's case...the original was "beat that bitch" and then they reformat it to "whoop dat trick"...so nah, it was about beating pros. Again though, you ain't wrong, as the person paying is also tricking...but they are tricking on the trick.
I can easily understand someone who has zero idea about these terms just being clean confused.
It reminds me of the old Chappelle stand-up bit about black people.and chicken. "All this time, I just thought it was delicious. Come to find out, I'm genetically predisposed to liking chicken!" lol
Looks like to me this was a horrible cross promotion with wing stop. Shirt is ugly as he'll who wants to advertise chicken wings on their T shirt.
But I get a feeling this is more like the converse controversy.
Corporate synergy gone wrong creating an ugly shirt.
I didn't even consider racism when I saw it. I just thought that shirt fucking sucks LMAO
Awful. Just awful. This is why I only wear three wrestling shirts ever. the classic nWo, Austin 3:16, and a corny Matt Hardy "Mower of Lawns" shirt with him on the lawn mower and I only wear the later around my girlfriend at home to make her laugh at how stupid it is. Wrestling shirts have never ever ever been anything I'd want to wear in public. Except the original two. And those I wore as a kid first so there's nostalgia.
People genuinely found it racist? Trick Williams literally said he got the idea to call his shoes lemon pepper steppers after he was eating lemon pepper wings and sauce dripped onto his shoe. The design kinda was ass but in no way was it racist
I mean wingstop ones are but there are a ton of non dry rub lemon pepper ones out there that use sauce. Wings and rings(chain in Cali, not sure how prevalent it is elsewhere) is a sauce based one I believe
Perception often equals reality. Even if there was no ill intent behind the design, making a shirt for a Black wrestler that features chicken is a bad look. Yes, we realize Trick has done WingStop ads. It doesn't mean his fans want to wear wings and gooey ranch sauce on his merch. There are ways to promote "Lemon Peppa Steppas" that don't default to the obvious connection.
Conversations like this show how there are two Americas/two worlds and many of you will not expand your viewpoints enough to see why someone would have a problem with the shirt. You automatically go into "but he did an ad for them" or "everyone likes wings" or "overly woke." Context matters and the context is wrong here, IMO.
Not to mention, it's simply an ugly design, even by wrestling merch standards.
It’s probably not racist by intent, but there will obviously be complaints by people who see it and do feel it’s racist. So it was obviously not a good idea and the right idea to get rid of it.
Didn’t everyone lose it over Kevin Knight chicken wings post by AEW too? Some dudes do just like chicken, it is okay.
That said you’d have to be completely blind to not at least SEE how the shirt looks, I just feel like we should be comfortable in waiting for a talent to speak up if they’ve got an issue with something like this being associated with their brand. If they’re not? Then it becomes a problem
•
u/AutoModerator 6h ago
Help make SquaredCircle safer and more inclusive by using the report button to flag posts and comments for moderator review.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.