WWE originally told Mustafa Ali that he was going to win the 2019 Men’s Money In The Bank Ladder Match. However, Vince McMahon changed the winner to Brock Lesnar.
This is considered an infamous moment on social media, as Lesnar gained a lot of heat for entering the match in the final minute and just winning the contract without putting any work in, which aligned with his “part-timer heel” character at that time.
During an interview with Chris Van Vliet, Ali revealed when McMahon told him about the change in plans:
“I show up to Money In The Bank, and they’re like, ‘Hey, you’re winning it.’ I go what?! Okay, cool. This is so funny because I’m one of the shorter guys in the match. So they actually had me climb up the ladder so they could adjust the briefcase so it was within grabbing distance of me.
All day we’re putting this match together. Everyone’s like, ‘Hey, man, congrats.’ (I’m like) Yeah, this is awesome. I was like maybe I can get this briefcase to light up, because I was wearing the light-up stuff at the time. I’m thinking this is one of those cloud 9 moments, I can’t believe this is happening, because it’s not happening.
So the match is about to start. Entrances have started. I want to say Baron Corbin is making his entrance; I don’t know why, I just have his music in my head; I have a very funny visual for you. So I’m wearing this light-up mask and I’m wearing this jacket that lights up and I have a glove, and they all kind of pulsate with lights, obviously.
Jamie Noble comes up, ‘Hey, boss man wants to talk to you. Go talk to the boss.’ I was like, Okay. The entrances are happening. Vince is looking up and I come over. Now mind you Gorilla is completely dark, so I just have these red lights that are flashing on Vince’s face and he’s all shadowy. So you can see the picture that I see.
He goes, ‘Change of plans. Do the match, everything you called. When the time is right I want you to climb up the ladder and grab the briefcase. Someone’s going to come out. I want you to hold the briefcase and just have shock on your face. He’s gonna run down, tip the ladder over, and you stay down. Do you understand?’ And again, my lights are just flashing on his face, so I see what he’s saying but there’s a moment where he goes black and it’s red, black and it’s red. I’m like, ‘Copy that, sir’.
I just walk away I’m like, it’s Brock. Who else could it be? I’m walking, I’m like, whatever. My music is hitting.
So he literally told me [right before]. None of the guys in the match know. Finn didn’t know. Randy didn’t know, Baron Corbin is in the match, Drew McIntyre, Andrade. No one knew. I’m the only guy that knows.
I’m walking down, I’m just focused on the match at this point. The match happens, climbing up the thing and man, it’s just like, I know everyone’s like well why didn’t you just grab the briefcase? I want to be like, because my boss told me.
So I climb up, I grab it. Brock’s music hits. They cut to him. I do the slip. You don’t see it, but when I’m looking down Brock hits a ladder out of the way, and it just completely annihilates a cameraman named Rico. Just hits him in the head. He goes down, he needs stitches.
I’m watching this and I’m like he’s gonna murder me! I hope I’m not destroying the mystique of Brock here, but what a pro. Gets in the ring, grabs me, looks up to me. He’s like, ‘Hey, kid, you ready?’ And I’m like yeah? He goes ‘Okay, nice and easy, one, two.’ And the thing is, he was so nice about the push that I was expecting this violent thing that I hurled myself off the ladder and I ended up hitting the top rope with my mouth, cutting my mouth, completely my fault, hurting myself, and I go down. He’s just pros pro man. I’m saying that, but you can see if you watch it back, if you cut to the clip of the guys on the floor selling, they’re all very unamused that this match happened that way.”
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