At several UK bookmakers you can bet on WWE events, (winner of Royal Rumble etc.) How does this make sense? Sports betting is generally on things that are unknown in advance, (like normal sports where every player is trying to win) or something that only a few peoiple know and won’t be betting on. (like gender of a royal baby) With something like WWE though, all the actors, writers etc. will know in advance who is going to win, seems like a huge opportunity to leak.
Not necessarily, especially with WWE. Vince McMahon is notorious for changing his mind on the outcome of a match on the day of, and for rewriting the show while it’s still on the air. One notable occasion is when Brock Lesnar beat the Undertaker at WrestleMania 30 - the only people who knew the finish ahead of time were Brock, Taker, Vince, and Triple H.
Somebody knows, yes, but most people that are betting aren’t in that circle.
Also, my understanding is that these are limited to pretty small-time novelty bets, so even if WWE writers themselves started betting covertly, they’d not likely be able to get more than a couple thousand.
From what I read today, there’s currently 1000-1 odds of Trump winning the Royal Rumble…
The average WWE watcher isn’t going to have the inside information of the arranged result, and no bookie would take a large bet that might be coming from someone who does.
These are basically novelty bets. They are promotional, to suck in new punters who will continue betting on other things on your site.