Brie Bella wasn’t planning on talking about Sydney Sweeney’s controversial gambling commercial at all. Then it aired while she was watching sports with Bryan Danielson and their six-year-old son, and suddenly she had a very different opinion.
Speaking on The Nikki & Brie Show, Brie explained that she’d already seen the commercial blowing up on social media, but assumed it was just an online campaign. Bryan, meanwhile, had no clue what everyone was talking about until it unexpectedly popped up during a game they were watching.
“Nikki and I were like, it was big news last week… My husband had no idea about any of this until we were watching the Padre game… or a football game. That commercial came on… Bryan goes, ‘Holy smokes, she’s naked.’ I go, ‘Brian, this is the commercial I was telling you about.’… My son saw that. Do you know how pissed off I was?”
That’s when everything changed for Brie. She said if the commercial had stayed on social media, she honestly wouldn’t have cared. People choose what they look at online, and she figured it was just another ad trying to get attention.
“I thought whatever… it was a social thing. A lot of people are slutty on social media. So I was like, whatever. I understand everyone’s point of view. Unfortunately… that is how we’re marketing a lot of things nowadays. I don’t think we need to show tits all the time to get something over. Right. I’m that girl. I don’t think we need it.”
Brie also said if the campaign was supposed to be about sports, she’d rather see female athletes being highlighted instead. She brought up the classic Mia Hamm and Michael Jordan commercials as the kind of sports advertising that actually inspired people.
“If we’re talking about sports, I actually do wanna see an Olympian slam dunking a ball. A female. I always remember the Mia Hamm, Michael Jordan commercials… That shit was so badass… and it inspired us as girls.”
She admitted the ad was technically promoting a gambling site, which is another reason she initially shrugged it off: “Now it’s a gambling site… so whatever. I was like, take it with a grain of salt.”
The problem, she says, wasn’t the product. It was where the commercial aired. Brie explained that she and Bryan are already careful about what their kids see on television. Sometimes she’ll even delay watching something just so she can skip certain commercials because her children get completely locked in when ads come on.
“My 6-year-old… Brian and I are very strict with what our kids watch with television. Sometimes I delay us watching so I can go through commercials. ‘Cause when they see commercials, they’re like zombies staring at the commercials. A lot of horror films are shown right now… I have to close my kids’ eyes or mute it because it freaks them out.
I did not like the fact that that was during a game… She’s fully like naked covering her boobs with footballs and straddling a basketball net. ‘What? This image is now embedded in my son.’ Like what is wrong with this?”
She said she was also relieved her daughter Birdie wasn’t in the room, and immediately started thinking about all the other families who may have seen the same commercial.
“I’m happy Birdie wasn’t in the room because as my daughter at nine years old seeing that, that’s concerning. But I think of all the kids that have seen that commercial now. I know it’s not on the actress. She gets her money… I’m not blaming her.
I’m mad at the fact that they allowed that to be… we’re watching sports. Prime TV. Sports is sports and sports is all about families. You sit with your families and you watch. Now I can’t be sitting there worried that they’re gonna see this again.”
The conversation eventually turned to people comparing the commercial to ESPN’s famous Body Issue. Brie said she doesn’t think the comparison works because she never viewed those photos as sexual.
“She tried to compare it to the Body Issue from ESPN… You can’t compare it. I’ve never looked at the Body Issue like sexual. I’m looking at incredible bodies… Olympians, professional athletes. It’s more about the muscle. Sports Illustrated… they want to be sexy. Let them do their thing. This was just over the top. It was borderline porn to me. Even her voice… it came off more like pornographic. This to me was, ‘How do we put over this gambling site? We will use sex to sell it.’ And we know exactly who to hire.”
Ironically, Brie said she and Nikki weren’t even planning to discuss the commercial on the podcast until they realized it had aired during a sports broadcast. Seeing her son watch it changed that.
“Nikki and I actually were not gonna talk about this… because we’re like, social thing… who cares? It’s for gambling… whatever. I didn’t care. The fact that it was on television, my son saw it because my kids aren’t on social media… that’s why I’m gonna bring it up actually because that’s wrong.”
She even joked she’d file a complaint if someone could point her in the right direction. Brie then argued commercials like this should at least come with some kind of warning.
“If there is a website that I can complain about what commercials we show…That should literally be like… parental advisory. Commercial, right? My kids would never be able to watch a TV show where they could see a woman’s body like that… But they can watch a commercial like that? Please. Make it make sense.”
Later in the discussion, the sisters talked about female athletes who criticized the commercial online. Brie said many of them ended up getting flooded with insults from men in the comments.
“Some of the female athletes that spoke up… so many of the men got into their comments like, ‘You’re just jealous. You’re ugly.’ ‘Cause they’re addicted to that OnlyFans. They’re like, ‘No, you’re feeding us everything we want.’Yeah. For free.”
Brie made her position one last time. She isn’t saying the commercial shouldn’t exist—she just doesn’t think it belongs during family sports programming.
“Social media campaign? Fine… because my kids aren’t on it. But watching sports? No, please. We all love to watch sports, especially with our young kids… MLB and NFL… you guys are in charge of advertisers and what’s shown. At some point the dollar can’t mean more than us.”
Brie even pointed out that she’s worked with DraftKings herself, saying gambling companies can make entertaining ads without taking the same approach.
“We work with DraftKings… and think of how we keep it so light and fun.”
For Brie Bella, this was never about Sydney Sweeney taking the job. It was about where the commercial ended up. If it had stayed on social media, she says she probably never would’ve mentioned it. Seeing it air during a family sports broadcast with her son sitting next to her is what changed everything.
Do you agree with Brie Bella, or do you think the criticism of the commercial has gone too far? Let us know in the comments below.
This transcript was produced exclusively for Ringside News from the original recording. Republishing the transcription in full is prohibited. When using excerpts, provide prominent credit and a link to this article.
