WWE SNME - 5/23/2026: Biggest Winners & Losers

Last night was the 44th edition of "WWE Saturday Night's Main Event." If you want to know what happened, there's a whole WWE SNME 5/23/2026 results page to read, as well as 3 Things We Hated and 3 We Loved from the show.

Now, it's time to break down the winners and the losers from Saturday's big show. This will not be a literal accounting of those things, as -again- there's a whole results page for that. Instead, we'll be taking a more holistic approach. Winners can be losers, losers can be winners, and people who didn't even appear can catch as many strays as I want to fire off.

There were literal winners, like Jade Cargill, and figurative winners, like the very concept of "Saturday Night's Main Event." But enough of my introduction, let's get into the nitty and the gritty.

"Saturday Night's Main Event," historically, has been a dogass show. It's some middling bulls*** that Vince McMahon put together to get WWE in the "Saturday Night Live" slot when "SNL" wasn't exactly "Must See TV." The matches were short. The finishes were usually DQs, count-outs, or even No Contests, in hopes of boosting PPV buys and live event ticket sales. It was essentially a glorified infomercial for WWE. Then it got brought back in 2000s and was once again, a cavalcade of DQs, count-outs, and other narrative half-assery.

While I don't think the modern run of SNME has been the greatest run of wrestling shows ever, it has absolutely been the best shows in the history of the event. It's a low bar but WWE is doing cartwheels over that bad boy. The only DQ of the night made complete sense, even if it was a bit frustrating.

Even without major events like the final matches of Goldberg and John Cena, SNME is still punching well above its weight. These are, quite simply, the best these shows have ever been, and there is no amount of nostalgia that will convince me otherwise.

No matter how many reports circulate about WWE's desire to rehabilitate the tag team division, I simply refuse to believe it until I see it. Logan Paul and Austin Theory are tag champs on one end, and on the other R-Truth and Damian Priest are killing time with the titles. Meanwhile, guys like Montez Ford and Angelo Dawkins are leaping over the ringposts –almost literally jumping through hoops– to make these acts look good.

The Street Profits got punked out on Saturday, plain and simple, and it's a shame. Ford and Dawkins are probably one of the most gifted tag teams WWE has on its roster, and it feels like they are going to spend their days being enhancement talent to the stars (and Austin Theory).

Look, ultimately Montez Ford is a winner in life. He's having a child with Bianca Belair and both seem pretty firmly entrenched in WWE, or at least as entrenched as anyone can be in the Private Equity/TKO days. Somewhere down the line, hopefully The Profits's will get their due, and lead the newly rehabilitated tag team division to greatness, but again, I'll believe it when I see it.

Jade Cargill might have lost at WrestleMania, but she was put right back into contention with Rhea Ripley on Saturday. Many people doubted Cargill, Michin, and B-Fab's ability to beat the superteam of Ripley, Alexa Bliss, and Charlotte Flair, and Cargill proved all the critics wrong, pinning Rhea Ripley in the center of the ring.

I honestly don't like to make a "winner" as literal as this, but pinning Rhea Ripley is no small feat, and it shows just how much faith WWE has in the Jade Cargill Project that they took over from AEW. It has never been a secret that Cargill was pushed into the spotlight too soon, and has been grinding her way through learning the ins-and-outs of the business, and Saturday proved that the hard work is paying off. Between her showcase match at WrestleMania, and her win tonight, 2026 is shaping up to be a very good year for Cargill.

The more that Bron Breakker becomes a star, the more that Logan Paul becomes a fairly seamless member of the WWE roster, the more glaring it is that they have to find a way to make Austin Theory work. This entry is something of a mirror to the last one, because like Jade Cargill, WWE seems intent on not giving up on the Austin Theory Project, and at this point it might be holding him back.

Theory was treated as something of a gifted wunderkind when he joined WWE in 2019, and ended up stuck in limbo between Speaking Out, and the overall de-emphasis on the Black & Gold NXT brand. Theory never quite got his feet under him, and at this point it feels like it stunted his growth a bit. You would never guess that this Justin Credible-esque third man was once poised to be Evil John Cena, even beating the WWE legend at WrestleMania. 

He's a solid hand, and in this economy I would never advocate for releases or anything of the like, but I was stuck during the main event, wondering how Theory could shake off the bad mojo that has stuck with him for much of his WWE career. 

Maybe a guest stint in TNA? I feel like he looks very TNA now. It could work. Does he speak Spanish? Can he be an Americano? Again, I am just spitballing.