10 Best Stone Cold Steve Austin WWE Moments
4. Austin 3:16
With several stitches in his mouth from an earlier bout against Marc Mero that night, Austin decimated Jake Roberts on the way to his first and only King of the Ring win. This was a time when promos in WWE weren’t tightly scripted the way they are today and Austin had simply been told to talk some trash on the mic.
Roberts was portraying a born again Christian so Austin took the famous John 3:16 passage Roberts had referenced and gave us the star making Austin 3:16 promo. During an interview with Larry King, Austin revealed, “I knew that when I beat him I was going to say something in reference to John 3:16 and say Austin 3:16 says I just whipped your ass. It was totally spontaneous. Had no one told me that he had cut that promo, Austin 3:16 would have never been born.”
Letting a wrestler find their own words instead of buzzword-laden monologues, who would’ve thought that might be a key to success...
Austin’s promo captured fans’ imaginations with signs and t-shirts becoming a norm for years at WWE events. The crowd interest in Austin lead to him being Bret Hart’s main rival upon the Hitman’s return in late 1996. From there, Austin started his march to main events.