It’s April 7, 2024, and WWE Superstar Jey Uso can barely believe his luck. He’s a major player at the biggest event in wrestling history, WrestleMania 40, and he’s pitted against his own twin Jimmy in a dream match they’ve wanted since being kids.
Jey’s fighting his brother in front of more than 60,000 people at Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field and millions more watching on TV or online. And the cherry on the top? Jey is being escorted to the ring by his all-time favorite rapper, wrestling fan Lil Wayne.
There’s just one problem: Jey vs. Jimmy is slated for early in the program, and the famously tardy Lil Wayne is a little late — but, uncharacteristically, just a little. Jey vs. Jimmy is match number four, and Wayne makes it to the building in time. Weezy is introduced as the “Greatest Rapper of All-Time,” and comes out to “A Milli.”
As the crowd begins rocking to the music, the song comes to a halt as the yell of “Uuuuuuso!” hits the speakers and Jey’s popular entrance theme “Main Event Ish” begins playing. The energy rises as the wrestler and the rapper take energetic strides and bounce to the ring.
“It’s on you!” Wayne yells, ad libbing the chorus of the song “It’s just me Uce/ Day one ish!” The fans shout Jey’s signature catch-term, “Yeet!!” in unison and stretch their arms forward, waving them up and down to the beat.
“Full circle, Uce,” Jey tells Variety of the moment, nearly a year later. (He endearingly calls most people “Uce,” short for “Uso,” which means brother in his Samoan heritage.)
He’s chilling in the famed New York sneaker store, Flight Club, a day after he wrestled at Madison Square Garden. He smiles wide while talking about Lil Wayne.
“He’s really my favorite rapper,” he enthuses. “I go back to early Wayne, Hot Boys, the first “Carter” album. When I first started wrestling [on the independent circuit], me and my brother would come out to Lil Wayne’s ‘Go DJ.’ To have him walk me out meand rapping, it was a full circle for me. Wayne is the best rapper alive for real.”
The Mania 40 moment and the crowd’s reaction wasn’t just taken in by fans, it was noticed by WWE executives. They have the biggest, most reliable focus group right in front of them. Jey isn’t just a pillar of the WWE, he’s become an official face of the company.
“I’m so proud of Jey,” T-Pain, who was in the floor seats at Mania that night, tells Variety. “He deserves it, bro. I think everyone knows and feels it.”
Jey’s rocketed rise the past few years even has a nickname, “The Yeet Movement.” His ring entrance has become so endearing that now he doesn’t come out from the back, he walks through the crowd, through the mezzanine levels and down the steps while the fans scream “Yeet!”
“Yeet” is a longstanding hip-hop slang term so widespread that it has two definitions in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, as an interjection (“used to express surprise, approval, or excited enthusiasm”) and, even funnier, as a verb (“to throw especially with force and without regard for the thing being thrown”). It has been brought to the forefront by Jey, who also uses it as a greeting or term of endearment. Merch bearing the word sells in the millions; WWE even introduced a Jey Uso cereal called “Frosted Yeet” for this year’s WrestleMania.
“Jey is that special kind of superstar,” WWE Analyst and Sirius XM host Sam Roberts tells Variety. “I knew he was different with Jey when one of the WWE Premium Live Events this year, they showed a shot of the audience: Lots of people were wearing Yeet T-shirts, and Jey wasn’t even on the show. That’s a different type of connection.”
Like the Rock before him, Jey is undoubtedly a people’s champ. He wins crowds over with his emotion and sincerity in the ring and in promos, where he’ll break character and laugh or even cry, not to mention the undeniable swag — glasses, gold teeth, the rhythm as he walks in time with the music — in which he reps for hip-hop culture has made him a made man in wrestling.
There’s been no group of people championing him louder than the hip-hop community — many rappers have been clamoring to come to the ring with him, just as Wayne did, as have Travis Scott and Migos veteran Quavo.
“When the lights come on, it’s go time with Travis,” Jey says. “He gets what we’re doing — he’s giving back to wrestling. Now he’s involved with the Rock and John Cena —would you have ever thought that? No, bro.”
However, he says he was as shocked as anyone when Scott viciously punched Universal Champion Cody Rhodes as he lay defenseless on the mat earlier this year, after he joined the Rock and Cena in the ring.
“He smacked the hell of out of him,” Jey says. “That made me mad for some reason. Somebody gonna have to get Travis Scott.”
Killer Mike tells Variety, “We’re used to only seeing hip-hop caricatures in wrestling — corny raps, exaggerated tropes like the boom box on the shoulder, crazy colors and fashions, butchered catch-phrases, and so on. With Jey, iit’s clear he was raised in the culture, so it’s genuine and not a gimmick. And that’s what why we fuck with him.”
That major pivot, marked the career changing shift in Jey in which he’s reaping the benefits of today. During the pandemic, WWE started crafting the most successful storyline in history, The Bloodline saga. It involved Jey and his brother Jimmy as well as their real-life cousin Roman Reigns who they grew up with. The Bloodlines run deep indeed. In addition to all being cousins of The Rock, Jey and Jimmy are the sons of WWE Hall of Famer Rikishi, while Roman’s dad is a WWE Hall of Fame inductee as well Sika, of the legendary tag team The Wild Samoans.
During the pandemic, Roman started his most dominate run: A game-changing era as champion that lasted 1,316 days and anchored WWE to their most profitable time ever. By his side, the Uso brothers became the longest running tag team champions ever, holding the belts for close to 700 days.
“It was easy for me and Roman to get real on each other because we’re family,” Jey says. “Same as my brother. It was real easy for me to tap into that because it’ll just come out. People felt that.”
After a complicated drama familiar to WWE, Jimmy Uso betrayed his brother and cost him the Universal title in a match last year where he was challenging Roman. Months later, Jimmy cost Jey the Intercontinental title, thus setting up their match at Mania 40.
“I was just thinking ‘I gotta elevate now,’ Jey says. “I came with all these new colors [in my outfits], new music, the ‘Yeet movement.’”
Jey’s biggest win to date happened in February, when he won the 30 Man Royal Rumble match, which has been a career defining feat reserved for upper echelon superstars: The Rock, Hulk Hogan, John Cena, Stone Cold Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels are previous winners. Jey won by being the last man standing and eliminating John Cena. With the victory, Jey earned an automatic spot at WrestleMania to fight the champion of his choice.
As Saturday’s night one of WrestleMania 41 is right upon us, Jey finds himself poised to be step up and get the entire package together. He has the popularity, the merch sales, the props from celebrities — but the one thing that has eluded is the World Heavyweight Championship.
Saturday night, he faces the villainous Gunther, who has been the bane of Jey’s existence, besting him in two previous matches and sneak-attacking him for weeks on Monday Night Raw. Gunther even brutalized Jimmy while Jay was strapped to a ring rope, unable to assist his brother. Gunther left Jimmy leaking from his head and wiped the blood on his chest and even tasted it. This latest development has added even more fuel to the fire in their feud.
“I gotta test my gangster against him,” Jey says of Gunther. “I’m ready, though. I gotta beat Gunter to solidify my thing. It’s my turn now.”
Jey Uso Vs Gunther will be the first match of WrestleMania Weekend as night one kicks off on Saturday 7 p.m. ET.
