On the tape recorder incident getting him fired from the WWF:
“It’s absolutely AMAZING how a lot of these stories within the pro wrestling bubble get so exaggerated or fabricated and take on a life of their own. Like with me and that stupid tape recorder incident. There’s like 10 variations of fabricated stories about what REALLY happened and what the REAL intentions were or what was behind it.
It was just a flat out dumb move as an attempted rib on two wrestlers in a car that backfired and costed me my life-long dream job with WWE. That’s it. That’s all there was to it. No wrongful intent whatsoever but I was never able to truly recover from that.
Even after I had gone to WCW for a little over a year before they were bought out. My second tenure with WWE, they did me no favors. I was nothing more than the cost of doing business for them. Just a bigger and better built body on the roster to put over other wrestlers they were trying to build like the Brock Lesnars of the world. I could just never seem to get a real break or push or love and support with WWE. I was just never able to truly recover from that tape recorder incident.”
On WWE never giving him a real second shot:
“Getting back to Kurt Angle and his comments about me in regards to WWE calling me up to the main roster….Everything was communicated and even encouraged / supported by them and on schedule. In fact, I was ready to go and they were the ones that kept postponing my main roster debut for a few weeks. Ironically, I ended up making my WWE debut on April 13th, 1999 for a taped Sunday Night Heat episode which happened to be on my dad Stan “The Man’s” birthday. I could feel his spirit energy within and all around me that night and in that arena which made my televised debut that much more special. It was a special night.
And confidence! Well, I must have had some form or level of confidence to have created a WWE tryout, get through those wrestling camps, work with legendary Jerry ‘The King’ Lawler and that Memphis TV show and territory and then called up to the main WWE roster, go to WCW and actually be given some love and support and a push to become 3-time WCW World Tag Team Champions with Chuck Palumbo, to then go back to WWE for a second run with that company…. Trust me, I had confidence.
In fact, I was so eager and committed and driven to elevate to that next level. I really started to develop and feel that during the course of my WCW run. Had more TV time, more time in the ring, put in higher profile matches, got to work with some of the biggest names in the industry and especially felt that burning desire and drive to want to really put myself on the map when I came back to WWE a second time. So confidence was not my issue. Not being able to recover from the tape recorder incident and or any other added political resistance was.
Confidence develops and grows with time and repetition. Maybe starting out in those wrestling camps and my rookie year I wasn’t the most confident at the time, nobody was, even Kurt had his doubts or I’m sure second guessed himself at times. But I will say in closing, I can only imagine what level of confidence I would have grown to and would have developed if WWE would have just invested in me a bit better. If I just would have had a REAL second shot at it.
Regardless, I’m still grateful and feel blessed that I got to experience a teenage dream even though it was short and didn’t even remotely scratch the surface of my potential then and what I could have developed into and could have become not just in WWE but for any organization.”
