Why Didn’t Kevin Owens Get to Jump Off the Pirate Ship at WrestleMania 37?

Kevin Owens was once again robbed of the opportunity to jump off a pirate ship during this year’s WrestleMania 37. The saga involving Owens and the stunt started last year when he decided that, regardless of what match he’d have at WrestleMania 36, he wanted to jump off the pirate ship parked at one end of Raymond James Stadium. Then the COVID-19 pandemic began, forcing WWE to shunt WrestleMania into the empty WWE Performance Center and Owens to give up on the idea. But then another opportunity presented itself when WrestleMania 37 was moved to Raymond James Stadium. Owens even reminded fans about the idea when the stage for the show was revealed, featuring an even larger pirate ship design.

“No, I want to do it. I can’t promise people that I’m going to do it because, you know, circumstances and whatever,” Owens told Ryan Satin back in February. “But, I can promise everybody that I’m gonna try as much as possible to do it. I’ll do my best. I’ll annoy anybody I can. I will get into anyone’s ear I possibly can. I will literally do everything in my power to get to the point where I can jump off that ship.

“But, even climbing up the ship, like, it’s already ready in my head,” he continued. “How I’m going to get up there, everything. I studied it. I did my research before I made that claim last year. So, I’m ready for it this year.”

And yet, the match between Owens and Sami Zayn during the show came and went without any kind of high-risk stunt. The match’s biggest claim to fame wound up being Logan Paul’s involvement, ending with Owens nailing the controversial YouTuber with a Stunner.

So why didn’t it happen? According to Sean Ross Sapp via Fightful Select, it was for a few reasons.

“There were discussions between talent and creative throughout the week, but the match not being no-DQ proved a big hurdle,” Sapp wrote. “The ship on the set was also a lot larger than many expected, but the weather as the final nail in the coffin.”