In an interview with Sports Illustrated’s Extra Mustard blog to promote his upcoming book, WWE Hall of Famer Shawn Michaels commented on people disliking The Kliq for the pull that they had with Vince McMahon, being threatened by The Undertaker, if Scott Hall and Kevin Nash would have stayed in the WWE, the Montreal Screwjob and more.
Highlights of the interview are below:
On people disliking The Kliq for the pull that they had with Vince McMahon: “People’s dislike for us was palpable, so it was our adamant decision to feed into that even more. There were times when the wrestling narrative, the inside the business narrative, seemed so silly and we made a decision never to glad-hand and take the heat off ourselves, we found the decision to add heat on top of us and make it worse was pretty amusing and that’s what we always decided to do.
On whether the Monteal Screwjob with Bret Hart would have happened had Scott Hall and Kevin Nash stayed with the WWE: “I don’t think anyone would have swayed Bret’s decision-making, but if Kevin and Scott were still there and I still had my friends, it would have prevented the entire thing from getting as out of hand as it did. Bret and I were friends, but we were young and we made bad decisions, we couldn’t see outside the wrestling business, it was the end-all, be-all, you were in that box constantly, so that’s all you thought about, if affects your decision-making.”
On being threatened by The Undertaker and the reports that he wouldn’t drop the WWE Championship to Steve Austin at WrestleMania 14: “Back then, Mark didn’t like me, but at no time has he ever claimed that he said anything to the face of Shawn Michaels and that’s because he didn’t. Mark went to everybody and told them, if this doesn’t go down the way it should, I’m going to have a big problem and Shawn is going to have a big problem, I’ll go over there and beat the heck out of him, but he never had to say anything to me. My whole intention at WrestleMania 14 was to drop the belt to Steve, but I was going to make everybody sweat it out and make them thing I wasn’t. Obviously, I got that accomplished, that’s extremely unprofessional, but that’s exactly who I was and what I was doing.”
The interview is available in full at this link.
