10 Fun Facts About My Trip To The 25th Anniversary Of WWE WrestleMania

7. Hall Of Fame Countdown Clock

As I discussed in my WrestleMania XIX piece, the 2008 Hall of Fame ceremony was a blast, the highlight being Ric Flair talking for over two hours about his career, telling stories and making everyone laugh as he reminisced with many stars in the audience. So in 2009, with Ricky Steamboat, The Funks and the biggest name in modern WWE history, Steve Austin, being inducted, I was anxious to watch what was sure to be an epic ceremony. Up first was the induction of Dory and Terry Funk, who would be introduced by Dusty Rhodes. As The Dream began to talk about The Funks, I noticed at the back of the arena facing the stage was a massive countdown clock. Dusty Rhodes had a 5 minute countdown in which to get through his speech. I found it strange but if we had a long night ahead of us, it made sense that maybe the inductors would have shorter speeches. My shock continued when The Funks had a 10 minute clock for their full induction speech. Now, Dory and Terry might not want to talk for an hour, but to sum up their storied careers they have to cram it into a combined ten minutes? I felt bad for the two legends as they rushed through their speeches. As the night progressed, the 5-10 minute clocks continued for Koko B. Ware, Howard Finkel and Steamboat. Hell, even The Von Erichs in Texas got a handful of minutes to soak in the applause from the fans. It felt tacky in the arena that all these legends being "honoured" were getting such little time to enjoy their moment. The Fink can be heard speeding through his acceptance so he could get it all in within the seven minute window allotted to him. For the main event of the night, Stone Cold Steve Austin, it had to be different, right? Wrong! The biggest star in WWE history got ten minutes to accept his induction into the WWE Hall of Fame in one of the most forgettable speeches of all-time. It still bothers me to this day, because after Hogan, Flair and others, Austin could've given a great speech but sadly he didn't get the chance. WWE would rectify it the next year and going forward but it put a dampener on the weekend in 2009 for sure.