Last week, 32 terrible titans of industry stepped on to the blood-stained mat of WCIA Death-and-Dismemberment Arena, but only 16 remain in this bestial battle royale to take home the treasured Golden Poo.

CLOSE CALLS
The first round of WCIA competition is usually littered with innards and sinew as smaller crap companies are destroyed by brutal blue-chips with name recognition and decades of customer disservice experience. But this year’s opening round had a surprising number of narrow victories.

By far the tiniest margin of victory was seen in the squabble between Chase and Wells Fargo, which saw Chase pull out in front to stay with only 51% of the votes. Perhaps this can be chalked up to generalized hatred of both banks. Regardless, Chase will have a much hardier foe when it goes up against two-time runner-up Bank of America in the second round.

Sallie Mae barely managed to pull off an upset win against PayPal, which seems to indicate consumers’ growing concerns about the current student loan mess (or that they’re sick of complaining about PayPal). We’ll have to see if good ol’ Sallie can repeat that feat when she goes off against perennial Final Four fave Ticketmaster.

Another surprise upset was spunky Spirit Airlines, which somehow capsized a bankrupt American Airlines with a respectable 59% of the vote. For a small, bottom-dollar carrier to defeat a major contender so handily speaks to this upstart’s future WCIA potential.

Spirit’s mettle — and sense of smell — will be tested by first-time WCIA entrant Carnival, which dumped United overboard in the first round and is hoping to translate its infamous Poop Cruise into a Golden Poo.

WHY’D THEY EVEN SHOW UP?
For all the close calls and upsets, there were the customary blow-outs, including a particularly gnarly victory by reigning champ EA, which opened up a full keg of derriere-kicking on Anheuser-Busch InBev, and earned an astonishing 92% of the vote.

That accomplishment makes Facebook’s 89-11 dislike of Google seem piddling by comparison. But we’ll see how the tournament’s two biggest blowouts do when they face each other in the second round.

Also enjoying a royal 89% victory was Comcast. The King of Kabletown beat up on T-Mobile like it was an also-ran wireless carrier struggling to compete with the bigger companies… oh wait. Hopefully, Comcast will at least break a sweat going up against DirecTV in Round Two.

Just like the first round, all matches will last for three hours. There will be two each day starting Thursday, with the first at noon ET and the second at 3 p.m. ET.

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