Vince McMahon's Assassination Conspiracy | Tales From Backstage
The shot NEARLY heard around the world that would have changed wrestling history forever...
It was the late great football manager Bill Shankly all the way back in 1981 that summed up why in many if not all countries, 'The Beautiful Game' means so much to so many. After 50 years in the sport as a player and a manager, he summed it up succinctly and humorously enough that any layperson could understand - and laugh at - the game being so beloved. In discussion about its' significance on Granada TV's Live at Two show, he said; "Some people believe football is a matter of life and death, I am very disappointed with that attitude. I can assure you it is much, much more important than that."
Simultaneously crystallising the idea of the religious-level faith millions of people have in a simple game whilst also summing up the deep love between fan and team, Shankly cut to the quick with the witticism. It really is everything to people. What scans as ridiculous to some and can be reduced by the usual clichéd dig about 22 folk kicking a pigskin about is in fact a fundamental life tenet to others. Such is the power of a love, a hobby, and increasingly, a business.
Wrestling works in much the same way.
Ask any fan how, why and especially when they got into watching regularly, and there's a good chance it stems from a point in their youth. Like cigarettes, wrestling targets the impressionable in order to foster the addiction from early doors. Some would argue that's not the only health-related comparison between the two habits. But whether it's because of being more susceptible to the magic or simply wowed by the incredible pictures painted by the industry at its best, wrestling is often most captivating at first sight. Plenty of fans that develop the deep love in early years spend the rest of their lives chasing a dragon - your writer and his colleagues included - that finds away to replicate a feeling at its most purest. This is wrestling's greatest power, and where there's power over people that great, there's money to be made. A lot. Even more than some folk think.
Vince McMahon realised this when he bought the company from his father Vince Sr. He revealed that he intended to break the long-held promises between his Father and the other promoters about not moving in on their patch. He was going to do exactly that, and he'd take Hulk Hogan back from Verne Gagne's AWA to do so. But before he could even promote his new red-and-yellow money spinner all the way to the top of his cards, there were whispers about people trying nobble 'The Hulkster'. Certainly per the man asked to do it anyway - Iron Sheik went on record on more than one occasion to say that Hogan's former AWA boss Verne Gagne got in touch with him before their all-important January 1984 match at Madison Square Garden and offered $100,000 to break Hogan's leg as a shoot rather than put him over. Hulk Hogan re-told the story in one of his fanciful autobiographies. Allegations and accusations of course, and not really any that can be sourced beyond the late Hossein Khosrow Ali Vaziri and Terry Bollea themselves. They weren't the most reliable of viz-oices in the wrestling space when sharing old war stories, but the bizarre and rarely-discussed case of Vince McMahon being caught and compromised to a permanent end by another promoter adds some credence to just how dead-set the territory gaffers were in stopping his pro wrestling path of rage.
Many accused Vince McMahon of trying to kill wrestling along the way. But what about the barely-touched-upon conspiracy where wrestling allegedly tried to kill him?
CONT'D....