:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/63405545/347_WM35_04072019cm_2435__eff7a22fdcade40d2cbc986f300e375b.0.jpg)
When a WWE pay-per-view (PPV) event is on the horizon, the staff of Cageside Seats usually offers predictions for all of the advertised matches on the card. This data can be used to calculate a simple predictability rating for any event.
Six different staff members predicted the winners for the matches that took place at WrestleMania 35 (Sun., Apr. 7) from MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Staff members received credit for a correct prediction of the winner of any match, even if they were wrong about the context of that victory.
The Cageside Seats match preview articles for WrestleMania also offered polls allowing Cagesiders the chance to weigh in with their predictions.
The following chart contains the prediction results for every match. The leftmost column includes the full match list. Below each staff member’s name, the number “1” is a correct prediction, the number “0” is an incorrect prediction, and empty spaces indicate that no prediction data was available. The rightmost column contains the overall predictability rating for every match, and the very last row shows the overall accuracy of each individual staff member.
The line for Hawkins’ match can be interpreted as follows: “6 out of 7 predictions for Hawkins’ match were correct, which is a predictability rating of 85.7%.”
Staff Predictions for WrestleMania 35
| Match | Geno | Sean | Cain | Claire | Kyle | Stella | Polls | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Match | Geno | Sean | Cain | Claire | Kyle | Stella | Polls | Total |
| Buddy Murphy vs. Tony Nese | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 28.6 |
| WrestleMania Women's Battle Royal | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.0 |
| The Revival vs. Hawkins & Ryder | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 85.7 |
| Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 28.6 |
| Brock Lesnar vs. Seth Rollins | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 42.9 |
| AJ Styles vs. Randy Orton | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 57.1 |
| SmackDown tag championship Fatal 4-way | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 71.4 |
| The Miz vs. Shane McMahon | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 14.3 |
| Women's tag championship Fatal 4-way | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 28.6 |
| Daniel Bryan vs. Kofi Kingston | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 100.0 |
| Samoa Joe vs. Rey Mysterio | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 71.4 |
| Roman Reigns vs. Drew McIntyre | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 85.7 |
| Triple H vs. Batista | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 57.1 |
| Kurt Angle vs. Baron Corbin | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 14.3 |
| Bobby Lashley vs. Finn Balor | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 85.7 |
| Rousey vs. Flair vs. Lynch | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 85.7 |
| Total | 43.8 | 37.5 | 56.3 | 62.5 | 50.0 | 50.0 | 75.0 | 53.6 |
These numbers add up to 60 correct predictions and 52 incorrect predictions, which means the overall predictability rating for WrestleMania 35 is 53.6%.
This decreases the overall predictability rating for 2019 WWE PPVs from 66.7% down to 61.3% (166 correct versus 105 incorrect predictions). For comparison's sake, the overall predictability ratings each year from from 2015 through 2018 were 63.4%, 61.1%, 61.6%, and 58.7%.
Despite Shane McMahon’s status as Best in the World, we were foolish enough to doubt that he would get the job done at WrestleMania. Only one staff member and just 14% of the community voters picked Shane to defeat The Miz.
The results were pretty similar for Angle’s retirement match, with just one staff member and 25% of community voters picking Baron Corbin to defeat your Olympic Hero in his farewell match.
The most difficult match to predict was the WrestleMania Women’s Battle Royal, where Carmella’s win seemingly came out of nowhere. Half of the staff and a majority of the community voters expected Lacey Evans to prevail in this one, and it turns out that she wasn’t even in the match.
On the other side of the coin, 96% of the community voters figured that the Demon Finn Balor would trounce Bobby Lashley, and that’s exactly what happened. The final vote count in the community poll was a staggering 483 votes for Balor with just 22 votes for Lashley.
And WWE wasn’t fooling too many people with the way they forced Curt Hawkins’ losing streak onto the card at the last minute. 79% of the community voters knew how that would end for The Revival.
Finally, just about everyone predicted that Kofi Kingston would win the WWE Championship at WrestleMania 35. All six staff members and 87% of the community voters nailed that one.
The staff of Cageside Seats didn’t have such a great night with predicting the winners at WrestleMania 35. How did you fare, Cagesiders?