Uso to challenge Punk for vacant WWE World Heavyweight Title at SNME

Jey Uso will challenge CM Punk for the vacant WWE World Heavyweight Championship on November 1 at Saturday Night’s Main Event in Salt Lake City after winning a battle royal on the October 20 episode of Raw, a result that has prompted a sharp online reaction even as the company says it will not alter its plans. The match, set for the Delta Center, will determine a new champion following an injury that left the title vacant, according to reports.

Uso’s victory on Raw was posted to the company’s YouTube channel and has attracted a large number of negative reactions from viewers, with third-party browser extensions estimating tens of thousands of dislikes compared with far fewer likes. Counts differ across estimates, but several reports put the number of dislikes in the tens of thousands. YouTube’s public dislike counter was removed in 2021, so these figures are drawn from external tools that estimate dislike totals rather than an official platform metric.

WWE sources told company insiders they do not treat the dislike estimates as a reliable indicator and do not plan to change creative plans in response. Those sources pointed to the limitations of third-party extensions, which...