Highlights

• Crown Jewel has vastly improved over the years, with 2022 and 2023 producing stronger shows and memorable moments.
• Sami Zayn had his first singles match in Saudi Arabia, marking a significant moment in his career.
• Both Drew McIntyre and LA Knight had previously held the TNA World Championship before challenging for WWE titles at Crown Jewel 2023.

Crown Jewel has quietly become an annual tradition for WWE, as the company returns to Saudi Arabia year after year, with 2023 marking the fifth installment (WWE only missed 2020 on account of the pandemic). Though, early on, the show developed a less than stellar reputation, it has a come a long way, taking a turn for the better in 2021, and producing stronger all around shows in 2022 and this year. The event included the top men’s and women’s championships being defended, a number of strong matches, and several memorable moments. Moreover, like so many major events promoted by WWE, the show included its share of interesting bits of trivia and hidden highlights that a number of fans might have missed.

7 John Cena Joins The Elite Club Of Wrestlers To Wrestle A Father And His Son In WWE

John Cena has had one of the most successful careers in WWE history, but hit an unusual milestone at Crown Jewel 2023. After wrestling Rikishi multiple times one-on-one in 2003 episodes of WWE SmackDown, he now lost to the big man’s son in a singles match as well at Crown Jewel, twenty years later.

RELATED: 10 Clean John Cena Losses You Forgot AboutCena isn’t the only person to accomplish this kind of feat. Other instances include Hulk Hogan beating both Bob Orton Jr. and Randy Orton in televised matches, while The Viper beat Dusty Rhodes and both Goldust and Cody. The Undertaker notably faced off against both IRS and Bray Wyatt. This club remains reserved for both top-tier talents and mostly stars with real longevity to have worked two generations from the same family.

6 Sami Zayn Worked His First Singles Match At A PLE From Saudi Arabia

While it happened during the pre-show, Sami Zayn nonetheless had a noteworthy moment at Crown Jewel in working his first Saudi Arabian PLE singles bout defeating JD McDonagh.

Zayn has been a part of WWE since before they started promoting PLEs in Saudi Arabia. However, he stayed away from WWE events held in this country for years due to political differences before making his debut there earlier this year in tag team action.

5 Each Man Challenging For A World Championship Was a Former TNA World Champion

The stories of Drew McIntyre challenging for the World Heavyweight Championship and LA Knight challenging for the WWE Universal Championship at Crown Jewel 2023. McIntyre was positioned to leen heal, bitterly looking to reclaim world title glory after his previous time on top was obscured during the pandemic. Knight came across more as an upstart—a babyface getting his first ever main roster title shot.

RELATED: 5 TNA/Impact Champions Who Elevated Their Belts (& 5 That Damaged Their Reputations)An interesting subtext to these challengers, though, is that both men previously enjoyed respectable reigns as TNA World Champions. McIntyre reigned there for three months in 2016, while Knight had a five-month reign in 2017.

4 Bianca Belair Continues Feuding With Damage CTRL One Year Later

Bianca Belair challenged Iyo Sky for the WWE Women’s Championship at Crown Jewel 2023. If The EST facing off with a member of Damage CTRL at this particular PLE, with title implications, felt familiar, that’s with good reason. Belair actually defended her title against Bayley at Crown Jewel in 2022.

The results didn’t pan out as positively for Belair this time, and arguably weren’t so positive for Damage CTRL either. Indeed, one of the biggest headlines coming out of this year’s encounter was the surprise return of Kairi Sane to assist Sky in what seemed to be unexpected to not only Belair's character, but also Bayley at ringside.

3 Since His Debut, Logan Paul Has Had More Singles WWE PLE Matches Than Rey Mysterio In The Same Period

There was a huge disparity in experience between defending United States Champion Rey Mysterio and Logan Paul when they faced off at Crown Jewel 2023. After all, Mysterio has over three decades of experience in wrestling, including having debuted for WWE over twenty years back. Meanwhile, Paul only worked his first match—incidentally, a tag match that also included Mysterio—in 2022.

Despite Paul only working on an ostensibly part-time, celebrity schedule, he has actually had more one-on-one singles matches in his first two years than Mysterio has had in the same period. At Crown Jewel, Paul’s tally rose to five, whereas it was only Mysterio’s third since the start of 2022. To be fair, the luchador worked quite a few more free television matches in between, including the bout in which he won the US title off of Austin Theory on SmackDown.

2 Sami Zayn May Have Screwed Cody Rhodes

After a hard-fought match with Drew McIntyre, it looked as though World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins was vulnerable to a Money in the Bank cash-in. Damian Priest made his way down the entrance ramp and handed his briefcase to a referee to get things started, only for a hooded Sami Zayn to jump him and run off with the case.

This sequence of events made sense for both Priest and Judgment day rival Zayn. However, there was an unspoken reality that Cody Rhodes had a match scheduled with Damian Priest for later in the event. While the rules of when a champion puts his or her title on the line, it’s not out of the question that The American Nightmare may have snagged a World Heavyweight title shot against the new champ. Rhodes was already the favorite to go over Priest, but on top of that, Priest presumably would have been at least a little worn down from facing even a beaten-down Rollins. The net effect of all this is that Zayn interrupting the cash-in may well have cost ultimately cost Rhodes a World Heavyweight Championship victory.

1 The Sheer Scope Of Anoa’is John Cena Has Wrestled

In working a match with Solo Sikoa, John Cena worked his fifth different member of the Anoa’i family one-on-one, after previously having squared off with Rikishi, Umaga, The Rock, and Roman Reigns—a testament to the range of opponents Cena has worked and the scope of his career.

RELATED: Every Active Wrestler From The Samoan Anoa'i Family, RankedOn top of that, it’s worth noting Cena also shared the ring with Rosey in the 2003 Royal Rumble, faced The Usos in tag team scenarios, and even faced Manu in one Raw tag team scenario in 2008.