Shawn Michaels has given a direct answer to one of professional wrestling's most frequently asked 'what-if' questions.
Speaking with Carmelo Anthony on 7PM in Brooklyn, Michaels explained why the dream match between him and The Rock never happened at WrestleMania, and he didn't mince words about the reason.
"He didn't like me," Michaels said. "I think over the years that he's had, there's been a big feud in the wrestling business with Hunter and I doing things to him, being mean and things like that. It's all been blown out of proportion. None of it was perfect, but these were things that he was fed a lot of when he was younger. But afterward, and to this day, we get along with each other, and we talk about things."
Michaels blamed the feud on the misinformation given to Rock early in his career and alleged that Michaels and Triple H mistreated him. He strongly hit back at those accounts, calling them inaccurate and exaggerated, while acknowledging that this perception shaped Rock's feelings towards him for a significant period. The two have since moved on, with Michaels noting that they still meet and talk with each other today.
Even if personal issues had been resolved sooner, time would have made the match impossible. By the time Michaels returned from the back injury that had sidelined him for several years, The Rock had already made the transition to Hollywood and was no longer a full-time presence in WWE.
"I think everyone would love to see it," Michaels said. "But by the time I came back, he was pretty far along with his Hollywood career and things like that."
Despite never having a match, Michaels spoke about the Rock with admiration. When he was asked to compare the two, he avoided the question without any hesitation. "What are you going to say? I mean, the guy came in, and I remember seeing him for the first time on Saturday Night Live and I was thinking to myself, Holy cow, this guy is going to be a huge star," Michaels said.
Michaels also reflected on Rock's early WWE performance, when he was introduced to the audience as Rocky Johnson's son and received chants of "Rocky sucks" from the crowd, who had not yet sold for him.
Michaels said, "When he first got there, he was getting a lot of 'Rocky Sucks' chants and stuff like that. So there was always ribbing in the locker room and stuff like that." According to Michaels, Rock's reaction to that rejection ultimately defined his career path. "They recognized it and realized you had to come back with something tougher, something more aggressive. And then they changed it. And when they did that, and they put them with the Nation, they really started to take off from there."
