|
Steve Austin has achieved everything that you possibly
can within the world of professional wrestling. His numerous title runs,
WrestleMania matches, and various Hollywood TV spots put him as one of the
top five wrestlers in the last five years. All these accomplishments leads
to his book titled The Stone Cold Truth.
First off, how are you?
"I am good."
When the idea originally came up to write the book, was it Jim Ross that
approached you to help you write this book, or did you approach Jim Ross?
"No. It was Jim Ross's idea because they approached me four or five years
ago wanting me to write a book. It would have been the first WWE book out,
but I said, 'No I don't want to write a book.' I just didn't feel like running
my mouth and being private by nature. I didn't feel like I had enough to
talk about. Several years went by and I took my leave of absence from the
company, and Jim Ross got me back in the company, and pitched the idea to
write a book. I said, 'Hey man, let's go to do this thing.' There are a lot
of things I want to settle and bury the hatchet."
The inevitable comparisons will come between Stone Cold Truth and Mick Foley's
Have a Nice Day. Some will say you are coming up three years late and a dollar
short with this book. Why should a reader plunk down their hard earned cash
for this, and can anything beat Foley's groundbreaking work?
"Theoretically as far as the timing of the book, yeah the business was a
lot hotter several years ago. The timing as far as our business goes could've
been a lot better. As far as any comparison you're going to get with the
Mick Foley book, Mick Foley is one of my favorite guys I have worked with
in wrestling, and he is just a cool guy and great human being as far as I
am concerned. That is a great comparison, but as far as a day late and a
dollar short, well it's Stone Cold Steve Austin. It's The Stone Cold Truth
and my life story. If you had any interest whatsoever in what we do or what
I did or what I still do on a different basis, then I think that's a good
reason to go and buy the book."
Will we get a good look in the book as far as all the events that went down
at the WrestleMania 14 win where you defeated Shawn Michaels with Mike Tyson
as the special enforcer, which was your first WWE World Championship?
"It will basically cover everything I did. Some of the things Shawn was going
through, the guy pretty much was a little bit burnt out, his lower back had
a lot of problems. We didn't even know if the match was going to happen.
There I was hotter then hell as far as the business goes. It was just kind
of a real dicey situation."
Will the fans get a good look of your thoughts of your off camera relationship
with Vince McMahon?
"Oh yeah. They will find a whole lot about it. The relationship between me
and Vince has been good and bad and it's been real good and real bad. There
has been a lot of ups and downs. The kinda comparison I like to make is that
you have a pro football team and you have a head coach and I am the quarterback.
He is calling the plays and he is supposed to run the team, but I am out
there running the plays. I see things different and I want to do something
else. When you're throwing the business that is pro wrestling in hand, and
you have dollars involved and the egos like that, it can be a pretty hairy
situation. It has been."
Does the book have a good look at covering all your major wrestling injuries
including your neck injury and your experiences through rehab back to the
wrestling ring?
"Yeah. I pretty much covered all the bad knees, the bad neck, the action
in itself, what I was feeling, when the action had happened, 90 seconds after
it had happened, and the lasting effects that it has had on my life. I still
suffer effects from that, and a lot of people have asked me why I haven't
gone and quit when all the doctors were telling me you need to get out of
the ring. We covered all that and I didn't feel like quitting. Pro wrestling
is what I was put here to do in my life. I wasn't satisfied with stopping
the career or ending."
In your book you talk about how Jake Roberts had influence on your career
and you go back to the King of The Ring 1996 match against Jake Roberts which
you won. How much influence did Jake Roberts really have on your career?
"Absolutely. He is one of my favorite workers to ever get in the ring. He
was very economical. He didn't do nothing fancy, but what he did made sense.
One of the classic storytellers whereas Ric Flair is one of the great
storytellers so is Jake, two different types of workers, two different promos.
If I would have never wrestled Jake Roberts in that match when I went to
the hospital and got my top lips hooked up with 14 stitches then I came back.
If Michael Hayes wouldn't have told me Jake Roberts cut a religious base
promo on me I wouldn't have said Austin 3:16 because that's the bottom line
because Stone Cold Said So. It was instrumental; it wasn't like it was going
to pop in my head for no reason."
In the book you seem to really have enjoyed your time with Brian Pillman.
Do you think the gun angle with the late Brian Pillman was too extreme?
"No. I don't feel like it was extreme at all. You watch our show and you
realize what it is. It's basically professional wrestling. It's sports
entertainment ok. So you know what it is and why you are watching it. I didn't
think like it was over the top, but some people did. I just think because
of the way it was executed I really meant everything I was doing over there
and he really meant it when he pulled the gun, but you gotta understand it's
like watching TV and I don't watch TV really anymore. But if you're watching
one of the shows you see what you see on the TV. It's the same thing with
our show."
Do you think the book clears up all the rumors as far as when you walked
out on WWE in the summer of 2002?
"Yeah I do. We talk about the injuries, politics that were going on, talk
about the creative, and how that was basically the icing on the cake, but
the bottom line was my health was failing at a pretty good pace. I was trying
to keep up with guys who were 90 to 100 percent and I was barely 50 and try
to maintain a level of performance that was barely satisfactory to me and
the fans and having a hard time doing it."
How do you see yourself retiring and leaving WWE when the time finally comes,
and do you think you will wrestle at WrestleMania 20?
"I don't know how I am going to retire. When that may come and how it's going
to happen because I really just make short term plans. I don't sit around
and think and plot my life out. I got a brother that can tell you what he
is doing in one or two years and give it to you on a calendar. As far as
WrestleMania 20 goes, I tell you that it is a possibility that I would get
in the ring again, but not a good possibility. I got to look down the road,
but when I don't make long term plans the only long term plan I make is the
quality of life at five, ten, and fifteen years. You go in this business
and do everything you do, and so you save your money because of your negligence
and not thinking things out to the enth degree, and you don't get medical
advice, and you end up in a wheelchair. What was it all worth? Not a whole
lot."
You dedicate a chapter to Owen Hart and how your whole neck injury came about.
What were your thoughts on the night Owen Hart passed away and how you had
to wrestle the main event with The Undertaker at WWE Over The Edge that evening?
"That was one of the weirdest things in my life. We're just hanging around
backstage and I remember me and Undertaker actually talking, and we just
got word that Owen had fallen. We all knew he was going to do the deal with
the harness from the arena roof. We knew when they said he had fallen it
was going to be bad. We didn't know how close he was to the ring, but when
they brought the news back it wasn't good news. Then shortly there after
from 30 seconds to a minute it came back that Owen was dead. You're fixing
to go out and entertain 18,000 people and realized one of your buddies had
died in the ring and the show is going to continue. I will say this, every
time you go to the ring you get an adrenaline rush, but that night I don't
remember feeling anything. I knew we had to go the ring and do the match
because the show was going to go on, but I didn't feel anything. I was pretty
damn numb and shocked."
Finally, the media has made your personal life seem to be the stuff of soap
operas. You've always been respected as a straight shooter, your thoughts
on you and your wife Debra parting ways and the small domestic disturbance
incident overall?
"Well, when we do what we do you reach a level of success. Everybody looks
at your personal life. So the fact that everything happened with the few
times I have been married which is three of them. The dispute I had with
Debra was well documented and it goes with the territory and the fact that
I had notoriety. If I would have just been Steve Williams living in a double
wide in San Antonio, Texas or something like that nobody would have cared
other than the law, but the people wouldn't have cared. Of course it is Stone
Cold Steve Austin so it got a lot of coverage, but we cover that in the book
of what I can talk about. It was water under the bridge, but I tell my story
the best I can and it was The Stone Cold Truth. As far as she goes, there
were things by law we had to leave out and we did as such."
You can contact Chris Yandek at Lyandek@aol.com
Home |
News |
Editorials |
Interviews |
Forums |
Chat Room |
Store |
Divas |
PPV Results |
TV Results |
Shows |
Links
| Metal Epicenter |
Contact Us/Staff |
