The Piledriver Report 05.06.10: The Shawn Michaels Story Part Four – The Main Eventer Lives

While Shawn Michaels recovered from a variety of nagging injuries, the WWF had him host an interview segment titled “The Heartbreak Hotel.” He also played Diesel’s corner man as “Big Daddy Cool” feuded with Razor Ramon for the Intercontinental title, which Diesel won on April 13th, 1994.

During the summer months, Shawn and Diesel teamed up together on a regular basis. Their tag team accomplished the ultimate goal on August 28th, the day before SummerSlam, when they beat the Headshrinkers for the WWF World Tag Team titles. At SummerSlam 1994, Shawn Michaels’ interference backfired in Diesel’s match, costing “Big Daddy Cool” the Intercontinental title against Razor Ramon. Throughout the fall months, the WWF started a slow build to an eventual split between Razor and Diesel. The two finally departed under heated circumstances at the Survivor Series.

THE BREAK-UP OF SHAWN AND DIESEL

“At Survivor Series we did the full turn. During the contest, I “accidentally” superkicked Kevin. We lost the match and he came after me backstage. I verbally assaulted him and took off. He was now a babyface and I his chief rival heel.

Three days later at Madison Square garden, Kevin beat Bob Backlund in less than ten seconds to become the World Wrestling Federation Champion. It was a great moment for Kevin, Scott, Kid, and myself. I was happy for Kevin. Yes, I had brought him in. And yes, I had been wrestling longer than he had, but I wasn’t jealous or bitter. He was my friend.

After he won the title, he pulled me in the shower and said, ‘I have you to thank for all this. When I came here, I told you I saw you being a rising star, and I wanted to hook myself to you. I have you to thank for everything. I never thought I could be a World Wrestling Federation Champion, and I learned so much from you.’ He said the best thing that ever happened to him during his career was standing ringside and watching me work. Kevin told me he learned more from watching me than from anything he’d ever done in the ring. And then he said, ‘We are friends, and that happens very rarely in this business. That’s why nobody likes us.’

I told him how happy I was for him. ‘Let’s make sure we’ll always talk and that we won’t let anybody stir up a lot of stuff to ruin our friendship. That means more to me than anyone.”

Following the break up of the Michaels-Diesel tag team, all signs pointed to a WrestleMania clash between the former partners. However, before they can face off at WrestleMania XI, there was the Royal Rumble to take care of first.

“I came up with an idea for the Royal Rumble. I told Pat Patterson, ‘If you want to get me over, put me in first and let me last the whole time and win it.’ Pat always liked my ideas, and he wanted to do something different too. I was the type of character that you wanted to hate, but you had to admit, ‘ He’s good.’ And that’s good heat. My heat derived from the fact that everyone thought they could take me, but they weren’t completely sure. And I was cocky. I wasn’t a cool heel like Ric Flair, or a big strong one like Undertaker. I was hateable through and through. If I won the Rumble from the first position, it would really make the fans angry. They’d be dying to see Kevin knock the snot out of me. However, there’d be that doubt. Maybe this guy can beat the seven-foot monster?

Pat and I discussed having a finish where Davey Boy, who would be the last one in there with me, would clothesline me over the top, but only one of my feet would hit the floor. Davey would think I had been eliminated and while he was celebrating, I would toss him over the top and win the match.

Vince was hesitant. The year before he had Bret and Lex Luger do something similar and it didn’t work. ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I can do it.’

‘No.’

‘I can do that. I’m an athlete.’

‘OK. But I know how you are. Just hit the one foot and come right back up. Don’t worry about dangling and all the melodramatics. You don’t have to go all the way with it. If he hits you too hard and you can’t control yourself….’

‘I can control myself.’

During the Rumble, I hung a little longer than maybe Vince would have liked me to before I pulled myself back in the ring. I knew they were going to play it back on replay, and I wanted to make sure they got it and it looked good.”

After Shawn Michaels won the 1995 Royal Rumble, the two former partners fought against each other for the WWF World Championship at WrestleMania XI. While Shawn did not beat Diesel on that night, the seeds were set for Shawn to become a main eventer. The first step would take place on the following night’s RAW episode. When Shawn was giving an interview, he mentioned that he wanted a rematch, but this time he would leave his new bodyguard, SID, at home. This did not sit well with the “Pyscho One,” as he attacked Shawn, and left him laying until Diesel came to save his former partner, thus turning Shawn into a face.

“The next day, we had a television taping in Poughkeepsie. When I arrived at the building, Vince told me he wanted to talk. ‘Shawn, we are going to switch you babyface.’

‘What! It’s because of the kickout (Diesel’s strong kickout of Michaels’ superkick at WrestleMania the night before), isn’t it?’

‘It was a bad call on my part. I admit it.’

‘Why is it affecting me? I’m the only heel you have.’

‘They like you, the people like you, Shawn.’

‘They like me, but they like to hate me. Now is not the time. You make the mistake and it costs me in my career!’ I was not happy.

‘We’re going to have Sid drop you- injure you-tonight, and you’ll go home for six weeks.’

I was so frustrated, so bummed. We had told him that the people were going to boo. ‘Vince,’ I said, ‘I would never tell you how to run your entire business, but please, leave the wrestling to me.’

Then I went and told Kevin what was happening. ‘They’re taking me off for six weeks.’

‘What for?’

‘They are turning me babyface.’

‘It’s because of the kickout, isn’t it!’

What could we do? Sid turned on me that night. He attacked me from behind and powerbombed me three times before Kevin rushed to the ring and chased him off. I was now injured and off on a six-wee paid vacation.”

The next major show that Shawn appeared on was the infamous King of the Ring in Philadelphia where the crowd turned on the event, and started chanting “E-C-W! E-C-W! E-C-W!” The way the WWF booked Shawn in the event had a lot to do with those chants. The fans in attendance expected to see Michaels crowned as the new King. Instead, Shawn was eliminated in his first match of the night when he fought to a time limit draw against Kama.

THE KLIQ

It was around this time that the group of Shawn Michaels, Diesel, Razor Ramon, and the 1-2-3 Kid started to gain backstage power. The group was nicknamed “The Clique” by Lex Luger.

“I was very close to Vince now, and so was Kevin. Hunter, through Kevin and me, was beginning to establish a relationship there. Because we had Vince’s ear, most of the other wrestlers began to resent us. They didn’t like me already. Kevin is such a friendly person that he was tough to dislike, but he still got heat for being in the Kliq. Many thought we were using our relationship with Vince to stay on top and keep them down.

Were we using our political clout to keep each other on top? Absolutely. What we did was no different from what Hogan, Savage, Piper, and Bob Orton, Jr. had done before. If you are on top, you want to make sure you keep working with people on top. That’s how you stay up there. The only difference between us and Hogan’s and Savage’s crew was that we actually liked each other. That’s another reason why we had heat. We didn’t resent each other’s success. We weren’t bitter. There were five of us, and it didn’t matter which one was on top. We could always work with, and trust, each other. In addition, we were also smart enough to want to wrestle other top guys like Undertaker and Bret Hart. It would have been stupid of us to not want to wrestle people who were that good.

We got close to Vince by design and wanted to be close to him. We liked and admired him. It was the smart thing to do.”

In July, the “Clique” would see two of its four “members” holding the WWF’s only singles championships after Shawn Michaels beat Jeff Jarrett for his third Intercontinental title at July’s “In Your House” pay per view. At SummerSlam 1995, Shawn Michaels defended his title against fellow “Clique” member, Razor Ramon, in a rematch of the WrestleMania X ladder match.

“SummerSlam was now upon us, and the creative team decided that Scott and I should do another Ladder match. They asked me how I felt about it. ‘I know we can put on a good show, but as for how I feel about it, I don’t like it.’

Scott and I both believed it was a no-win situation. We had already done a Ladder match, and we knew we couldn’t top it. We didn’t make a huge deal about it, though. It was one of those things, if you want it, I’ll give it to you and I’ll make it the best I can. This is your show. I don’t like it, but it’s up to you.

Right before the match, Vince came up to us and told us that we couldn’t use the ladder as a weapon.

‘What?’

‘You can’t use the ladder. We have a new violence code. Some people are starting to come down on us.’

‘It’s a Ladder match. I have to hit him with it.’

‘Can’t do it.’ So we didn’t.

The odds were against us; however, I don’t think there was a disappointed fan in the entire arena.

The new restrictions made it a lot tougher for us, but we made up for it by doing a few more moves off the ladders. I have to say that even though I felt like there was no way we could pull the match off, it was a wonderful challenge. We did as good a job as possible. Was it the first Ladder match? No, but it couldn’t have been. The important thing was that we had stolen the show once again.”

The next month, at “In Your House,” the WWF World Champion Diesel and the Intercontinental Champion Shawn Michaels teamed up to beat the WWF World Tag Team Champions Owen Hart and Yokozuna for the tag team titles. Now the “Clique” held every championship in the WWF (although they would have to vacate the tag titles the next night on RAW).

While it could be argued that the “Clique” did not have any backstage “power,” and Vince was only pushing those wrestlers that were the best in the company (as Shawn would say), the wrestlers were starting to see evidence to the contrary. In Bret Hart’s autobiography, he mentioned that he was asked to join the “Clique” when it was forming. The purpose of the group, he was told, was to have each member in the group basically have a group of guys that he could work with on top. Thus, Bret could feud with Diesel, then follow that program up with a few months against Razor, and then Shawn. While he was programmed against these men, the other members in the group would have programs against each other as well.

SYRACUSE

On October 13th, 1995, Shawn Michaels was parked in a car outside of a bar with Davey Boy Smith and the 1-2-3 Kid in Syracuse, NY. Shawn Michaels was attacked by a group of military personnel that left him bruised and beaten.

“Kevin, Scott, and Hunter were on a European tour and I was traveling with Kid and Davey Boy Smith through a run in western New York. Upon arriving in Syracuse, we checked into our hotel and told some folks in the lobby that we were looking for a good place to go out. They said, ‘Follow us,’ and we did.

They led us to a small club. Everyone in the club knew who we were. The women were all over us, and I’m sure this didn’t endear us to any of the other guys there. I received attention because I was on television. In our culture the vast majority of people think that if you are on television you are someone, and that’s what was going on.

Apparently, someone in the bar told me that I was out of it. So, I left to go out and sit in the car until Kid and Davey were done. As I went out, a bunch of guys followed me, and as I was getting in the car, they attacked me and beat me up pretty good. Somehow I made it back to the hotel and was placed in front of Sunny and Chris Candido’s door. They saw that I was in bad shape, called an ambulance, and came with me to the hospital. When I woke up, Sunny was sleeping next to me on a gurney.

When Kevin and Scott came back from Europe, they tore into Kid and Davey. They sort of had a big brother complex when it came to me, and they were very angry with those guys. Everyone knows this wouldn’t have happened if Kevin and Scott would have been there.”

Shortly after the attack, the WWF held an “In Your House” pay per view where Shawn “forfeited” the Intercontinental Championship to Shane “Dean” Douglas. Even though he was legitimately hurt, and would not return to active competition until a house show six man tag team match on November 5th, this is the point in time where people started to notice that Shawn had a knack of doing jobs. Whether this was real, or just coincidental.

To make the “Clique” look even worse in the eyes of the lockerroom, after Douglas was handed the Intercontinental title, the former “Franchise” did not get a title run. Instead, he dropped the title later the same evening to another “Clique” member, Razor Ramon.

“It was the office who decided Scott would win the title. There was no great conspiracy on our part to keep the belt within the Kliq. And with all due respect to Shane, he wasn’t getting over. They had already given up on him.”

On the November 20th addition of Monday Night RAW, the WWF started an angle stemming from the real life beating Shawn took in Syracuse. During his match with Owen Hart, Shawn Michaels collapsed in the ring. This “worked” collapse was said to be due to Shawn suffering from post-concussion syndrome. For the first time, in what would turn out to be numerous times, the Shawn Michaels character was contemplating retiring from the ring.

“We had planted the seed that I had suffered a serious injury. A couple of weeks later in Richmond, I wrestled Owen. He gave me an enziuri and I collapsed. No one besides Owen, myself, Vince, and Jim Ross and Jerry “the King” lawler knew that I was doing this.

We really wanted it to look real and had convinced Vince that we should go to dead air when it happened. If J.R. and King kept talking, people would know it was a work. Vince didn’t like the idea of going to dead air, but he finally agreed. As I lay prone on the mat, J.R. and King dropped their headsets and made it look like this was not part of a storyline. The last five minutes of the show was all dead air with pictures of me laying in the ring and the EMTs trying to revive me.
I was taken to the hospital, where I worked the doctors. I acted like I was all groggy. Hunter came with me and played his part of concerned friend perfectly. I even had to sign a release to leave the hospital. Officials there told me that they had been flooded with inquiries about my condition. We pretty much fooled everybody.”

Shawn would be out of action for two months. Upon his return, Shawn would win his second consecutive Royal Rumble. For the second consecutive year, Shawn was going to fight for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship. However, unlike last year, when former NFL football player, Lawrence Taylor closed the show, at WrestleMania XII, Shawn Michaels would be on the way to earning his monicker of the “main eventer.”

SHAWN AND BRET

At the 1996 Royal Rumble, the WWF started to tease a slow heel turn with “Big Daddy Cool” Diesel. Bret Hart’s WWF World title defense against, fellow fan favorite, the Undertaker would end in a disqualification following Diesel’s interference. Later in the evening, Diesel and his best friend, Shawn Michaels, were the final two competitors in the main event battle royal. Shawn Michaels would win the match, and a spot in the WrestleMania XII WWF World title main event, after eliminating Diesel. The ex-WWF World champion did not take to kindly to his elimination. He appeared to be upset with the “Heartbreak Kid,” but the two would give each other a high five to show that every thing was cool between each other.

While Diesel was having problems dealing with life without the WWF World title, Shawn was having problems of his own. Owen Hart was taking credit for “taking out” Shawn Michaels. He convinced Michaels to put his #1 contender’s spot at WrestleMania on the line in a match at the February pay per view.

A few weeks before Shawn Michaels was to fight Owen Hart at the pay per view, the WWF held a house show on January 26th at Madison Square Garden. During the main event steel cage match, the Undertaker interfered on Bret’s behalf, thus costing Diesel a shot at recapturing the WWF title. This brought out Shawn Michaels, and the lines were drawn in the sand. The Undertaker and Bret Hart against Diesel and Shawn Michaels would headline the next Garden card.

The February In Your House pay per view took place on the 18th at the Louisville Gardens in Kentucky. Shawn Michaels gained a measure of revenge against Owen Hart, and retained his spot in the WrestleMania XII main event, by pinning the “King of Harts” shoulders to the mat. Later in the show, Diesel’s quest to regain the WWF World title was foiled once again, as the Undertaker busted through the mat, grabbed Diesel, thus allowing Bret Hart to escape the cage.

On St. Patrick’s Day, Diesel was set to get revenge on the Undertaker and Bret Hart. However, when Diesel lost his cool, and struck the Undertaker with a chair, “Big Daddy Cool” and the “Heartbreak Kid” were disqualified. Diesel took the chair, and nailed Bret Hart, as well as Shawn Michaels. The “Dudes with Attitudes” partnership was officially over.

As the drama between Diesel, Bret Hart, the Undertaker, and Shawn Michaels was unfolding, the WWF was in full hype mode for WrestleMania XII. The main focus of the 12th edition of the WWF’s premier supercard was the clash between Shawn Michaels and the WWF World Champion Bret Hart. On the February 26th edition of RAW, the WWF Commissioner Roddy Piper announced that their upcoming title match would be contested as a one-hour marathon match. Throughout the weeks leading up to WrestleMania, the WWF presented special training videos of Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart preparing for their match. The WWF portrayed Shawn’s quest for the gold as a man chasing his boyhood dream. Along for the chase was Shawn’s original trainer Jose Lothario. Jose would be featured predominately in the videos. He would even start to accompany Michaels to the ring during Shawn’s matches.

According to Shawn, “It was Vince who came up with the idea to go with the “boyhood dream” storyline for WrestleMania. He brought me in one day and sasid, ‘I want to tell your whole story. How you wanted to be a wrestler since you were twelve, your dream to be a champion and all the ups and downs of your career to get to this point. There’s nothing better tan that. It’s true, it’s real.’

Jose Lothario was a big part of my story, and we decided to bring him in and have him train me for the match. It was a feel-good moment for our show, and in real life as well. A lot of people didn’t like having Jose there. They thought having him there was corny, that it brought down the coolness of my character. The world had changed, and this was not the time to be a white-meat babyface, but I didn’t care. Jose was a big part if my story. My family was a big part of my story. I wanted them to be a part of it. I didn’t care if some people thought it wasn’t cool.

It was Pat Patterson’s idea to have Bret and me work a one-hour, most-falls-wins Iron Man match. Whenever he thought of or heard a good idea, he would get so excited. He told me, ‘The people will go crazy! They will love it! You two guys will tear the house down!’

I was psyched because I would finally have the chance to go an hour in a singles match, and because it would be a real challenge to keep the fans interested for the entire time. To pull this one off, Bret and I were going to have a great wrestling match. The challenge was huge, but I was up for it. When I won the title, I wanted people to say, ‘He’s the champion because he is the best.’ Did I want to go an hour with Bret? I would have gone two if Vince wanted.

At this point, Bret and I got along fine. I don’t ever recall having a bad time with him until after I won the World Wrestling Federation Championship. When we first talked about the match, Bret said, ‘Vince spoke with me and I’m in board. I’m more than happy to do it for you. I don’t have a problem putting you over. I just want the match to be good.’ He then made it very clear that he was doing me a favor, and he reminded me that he had told me a few years ago that he thought I would be the guy to take his spot.

I understood that Bret wasn’t thrilled to be losing the title. Nobody ever wants to lose it. No one ever wants to step down from being the top guy. But that’s business, so you do what the boss asks you to do. Our conversation was a little uncomfortable, but that was normal.

Bret was a bit worried about going for an hour. His first concern was fitness. He told me that he would let me know how he was feeling during the match by giving me numbers between one and ten. If he said anything below five, it meant he was feeling good. If he said “eight,” we needed to slow down. If he said “ten,” we would grab a rest hold. I was very cool with this system. We wanted to know how the other was feeling so we could make the match as good as possible.

Bret was also worried about how we would fill the time. I know this is going to sound offensive coming from me, but Bret was not a great wrestler. He was good-very, very good-but not great. He wasn’t that versatile in the ring. The things he did, he did well, but he didn’t do a lot of exciting stuff. With Bret, you couldn’t put a twist on the Russian leg sweep, the backbreaker, the drop of the elbow from the second rope and then the Sharpshooter. Once Bret went into his routine, he wouldn’t change it up.

With me, he was a little better. When we discussed the match, he said, ‘We need to first start thinking about different moves. We know all of our basic stuff that we do, that we want to get in, but we’re in an hour match. We are going to have to do moves that we haven’t done before. How do you feel about you coming up with the first thirty minutes, and I come up with the last thirty?’

‘That’s great,’ I answered.

Wrestling an hour was special, but I thought we could make it even more exciting if we kept it to one fall and ended up going into overtime tied 0-0. I didn’t think Bret and I should be beating each other a bunch. If we were that easy to beat, we shouldn’t be there wrestling for the World Wrestling Federation Championship. I didn’t think Bret would make a big deal about going to overtime after the match and use it as an out that I didn’t really beat him.

I came up with the idea where he would have me in the Sharpshooter and I’d be hanging on for dear life as regulation time ran down. Some people had a problem with this, saying that it would look like the clock saved me from tapping out and would make me look weak. I just thought it was good drama.

At the end of regulation, we had Gorilla Monsoon come down to the ring and order the match to continue until there was a fall. Two minutes later, I nailed Bret with a superkick out of the blue. I went for the cover, but couldn’t get to him because I had been in the Sharpshooter for so long. Slowly, he managed to struggle to his feet. I too had recovered a bit, and I ripped him with another superkick and this time made the cover.

As I knelt in the ring clutching the belt to my chest, reality started to set in. Winning the World Wrestling Federation Championship did not fulfill my boyhood dream. It had far, far exceeded any dream I ever had as a boy.

When I made my way back to the dressing room, most of the guys came by and congratulated me. Everyone knew it was a huge moment for me. Pat Patterson, the man who supported me from the first minute Marty and I came in, and had supported me ever since, hugged me. Vince hugged me. Kevin hugged me. It was very emotional, and I was completely spent both physically and mentally. I broke down crying.

About the only person I didn’t see was Bret Hart. Usually, you shake hands with your opponent after the match and thank each other. I never saw Bret after the match, and he never said a word to me. Bret took off immediately, and I wouldn’t see him for another seven or eight months.”

Bret Hart, in his autobiography, saw things a little bit differently then Shawn Michaels did. In talking about how the two characters were portrayed leading up to there WrestleMania XII encounter, Bret said, “That afternoon (before RAW) Vince got me, Shawn and Roddy together and carefully rehearsed the live interview we were to have that night, building heat for our title match. Shawn was scripted to outwit me all the way through it.

In late February, Jim Ross and a WWF camera crew flew up to Calgary to get some footage of me training for the big match. They had filmed Shawn in sunny San Antonio, where he ran the steps at a football stadium, did upside down sit-ups and pretended to spar with his mentor, Jose Lothario. Vince was selling Shawn as a guy trying to realize his boyhood dream of winning the gold. I was portrayed as the wily veteran from the dungeon who had every intention of being the champion for a long time.

February in Calgary is the coldest time of the year, but they had me jog along Scotsman’s Hill so they could get panoramic views of the city with the Rockies in the background. It was so icy that I had to run carefully, so it came across on film like I was running about a mile an hour. Another magic moment taped for the world to see was when they asked me to swim laps in my pool. But the topper was when they filmed Stu stretching me in the dungeon, an eighty-year-old man tying me up in knots with me eagerly tapping out!

I trained for that match as hard as I ever had for anything. Shawn was eight years younger than me, and I wasn’t going to let him outshine me. Like me and Davey at Wembley, I wanted the fans to remember the loser in this one. I would break their hearts and disappear until Shawn had nobody to work with except me. I saw a rematch up ahead with me taking back the title, which would build up for yet one more match where I’d be more than happy to put Shawn over-to once and for all thrust the torch into his hand. Done right, Shawn and I could draw money for years with a big rivalry, taking turns putting each other over.

I found Shawn at lunch-time on the day of WrestleMania XII, and we sat down to compose our match much like musicians composing a song. I let him piece much of the first twenty-five minutes while I figured out the rest. I told him I expected we’d be working a rematch when I came back in six months. In order to feed the supposed heat between us, I wouldn’t shake his hand after he won. Instead, I’d simply walk out, leaving the crowd to assume that I was really pissed off at the ref’s decision. Shawn nodded and said, ‘No problem.’ He’d spent much of the morning practicing a speciakl entrance, being lowered to the ring by a steel cable. I was impressed with how focused he was.

From the start (of the match), Shawn made it clear that this wasn’t going to be so much a great work as a great contest. It was rather obvious to me that he’d been coached to lean on me as much as he could. He did sneaky tricks, such as dragging his heavy, steel-toed motorcycle boots across my face, scraping my lips up, which led to a subtle hour long potato harvest.

We were both able to remember every spot we’d mapped out only hours before, two great wrestlers in their prime trying to outdo each other under the guise of working together. I’ve always believed that the intention was for Shawn to drag me off the mat for the last twenty minutes. If fans go back and study this one closely, they’ll see that at times I was stiff, but I was never slow or heavy.

Our match seemed to unravel in slow motion. Shawn took some fantastic bumps. From the way he went dead weight on me, I assumed he was getting tired, and I was somewhat surprised that I had to keep dragging him off the mat.

With five minutes remaining I hoisted him up like a sack of cement and snapped him in half across my knee. I smiled at the time clock. I had told Shawn the last five minutes were all his, and we were right on schedule.

I leaped off the second rope inly to be jolted by a vicious stiff boot to the jjaw by Shawn, and then one potato after another. He took every liberty he could, stiffing me on dropkicks and elbow smashes.”

Bret describes the aftermath, “I couldn’t believe my ears when I heard Shawn angrily tell Earl, ‘Tell him to get the fuck out of the ring! This is my moment!’ I dropped out to the ring floor and left him there on his knees, crying with the belt in his arms. I had firmly placed the torch in that little monster’s hands. But I also knew that no one was going to forget about me. With my head held high, I walked to my waiting Lincoln and burned rubber as the credits rolled.”