The rumor mill is certainly running rampant now that WrestleMania season is on the horizon. And of course WrestleMania season also means Hall of Fame season, and it is at that time that the stars from the past, that helped shape and make the industry what it is today, get the respect they deserve and get inducted into the WWE Hall of fame.
One such man that may be getting the nod so to speak is none other than the legendary MMA fighter, WWE Superstar and UFC combatant and champion, Ken Shamrock. This would be more than deserved. After dominating in the UFC, Shamrock parlayed his mat skills into the realm of WWE and did quite well for himself there, having a string of epic matches with the likes of Owen Hart, Steve Blackman, The Rock and a plethora of others.
He would leave WWE in 1999 after an on-screen feud with Chris Jericho. He went back to MMA at that time but would return to pro wrestling in 2002, this time wrestling on the independent circuit and of course ROH and eventually TNA, where he enjoyed quite the career as well.
He was of course inducted into the Impact Wrestling Hall of Fame because of his contributions there…
via Impact Wrestling /YouTube
He left WWE for specific reasons as it turns out, certain frustrations, and despite these, when asked if he would be honored if the company would induct him in their aforementioned Hall of Fame, he had the following to say:
“Oh, absolutely. I mean, when that happens, you know, obviously I’m going to be very excited.”
And about those frustrations that led him to depart the WWE, he also had loads to say. These comments and the above statements were made during a interview on Steve Fall’s Ten Count:
“I think there were a lot of things that transpired during that time. You know, obviously, the thing that happened with Bret was very disappointing, very discouraging. I wasn’t comfortable with how they were using me. I was getting beat, you know, and I developed this character, the world’s most dangerous man, not in pro wrestling, but I developed it in being a real fighter…
So when I went in there, one of the things that I made it really clear was that, you know, I have my reputation, my name. So if things made sense, and the angles or storylines made sense and that I wasn’t going to be, you know, crushed as the world’s most dangerous man through all these different scenarios, I would be okay as long as they didn’t destroy what I already built…
So I just felt like, at that time, after the thing that happened with Bret, they had some other things they wanted me to do like wrestle with Chyna, which is something that I told them, because my kids were five, seven, and nine or something like that at the time, and I had always told them, you don’t hit girls. You know, it was just a thing, right? …
They would go into school and these kids believed wrestling was real. So then they wanted me to go in there and fight Chyna, I was like, ‘I can’t do that’, and they’re like, ‘Well, why not?’ I’m like, ‘Because I’ve been preaching to my children that you don’t hit women.’ Well, but this is just entertainment.’ It’s like, ‘But they don’t know that’, right? …
So I didn’t want to do that, but we worked around it. We figured it out…I’d already built my name. I was already down the road. I already had a family and that just wasn’t for me. But if you’d asked me when I was 22 or 23 years old, absolutely, but just not the right time for me.”
