“He Wanted Him to Flop”: Vince McMahon’s Secret Plot to Sabotage Stone Cold Steve Austin Revealed
We all know Stone Cold Steve Austin as the beer-bashing, middle-flying anti-hero who single-handedly saved WWE from oblivion and turned the Attitude Era into a cultural phenomenon. But what if we told you that the man in charge nearly pulled the plug on the Texas Rattlesnake before he ever got hot?
It sounds insane now, but back in the late 90s, Vince McMahon was reportedly furious that fans were actually cheering Austin. Instead of leaning into the gold mine he had, “The Chairman” wanted to bury the character and turn Austin back into a laughingstock.
Longtime WWE producer David Sahadi recently pulled back the curtain on this wild “what if” scenario during an appearance on Wrestling Observer Radio. According to Sahadi, the Stone Cold gimmick was almost “dead on arrival” because McMahon saw Austin as a villain and couldn’t stand the crowd reaction.
Sahadi recalls a tense corporate meeting where McMahon, Kevin Dunn, and other top brass gathered to discuss the “problem.” The boss was baffled and frustrated.
“I want fans to boo him, and they’re not. They’re cheering the hell out of him,” McMahon reportedly complained to the room. His solution? Rip the rug right out from under the fans.
McMahon’s grand plan was to scrap the Stone Cold persona entirely. He wanted to revert Austin back to his failed “Ringmaster” gimmick—you know, the one with the terrible powder-blue tights and the generic vibe that put fans to sleep. He even suggested making Austin’s hair “stubbly” to kill his look completely.
Think about that for a second. Just as Austin was tapping into something real and rebellious, the boss wanted to stuff him back into a boring suit and tie (metaphorically speaking) and force fans to hate him.
This meeting reportedly took place right before Austin’s legendary angle with Mike Tyson—the very moment that would rocket both Austin and WWE into the mainstream stratosphere. If McMahon had gotten his way, that iconic “Austin vs. Tyson” stare-down might have never happened. Instead of flipping off the boss and becoming the voice of the people, Austin would have been just another forgettable mid-card act.
It’s the ultimate example of a genius being wrong. Vince McMahon’s “fix” would have been a disaster. Luckily, the fans had already made up their minds, and their defiance forced the company to change course. The result was the most profitable era in wrestling history, all built on the back of a guy the boss initially wanted to fail.
