10 Banned Photos WWE Don’t Want You To See
8. Ultimate Warrior Leaked Contract
WWE has for years cultivated the image of itself as a star-making factory.
They took charismatic stars in other territories in the ‘80s, and marketed them into household names. In the ‘90s, the WWF was more brilliant still, taking mere midcarders from WCW, like Steve Austin, Mick Foley and Triple H, and using them to beat WCW - who used WWF’s old stars, and still couldn’t win. In the 2000s, Vince’s genius knew no bounds!
He could take muscleheads with no name value whatsoever, like John Cena, Batista, Randy Orton and Brock Lesnar, and usher in a bold new era!
That’s the narrative, anyway, and if it wasn’t debunked by A) Hulkamania existing before Hogan returned to the WWF and B) Steve Austin and John Cena devising their own personas to reach that megastar strata, then it’s easily rubbished by a desperate Vince McMahon offering a contract to the Ultimate Warrior in December 1997.
Vince didn’t immediately conceive of the Attitude Era as the next great chapter: his first impulse was to make the sort of panic move he buried WCW for making.
He wasn’t a forward-thinking genius. He didn’t 100% believe in Stone Cold Steve Austin, much less the Ringmaster.