10 Things You Need To Know About The Dawn Of WWE's Attitude Era
8. Austin 3:16
The initial presentation of the Ringmaster character more or less proved that McMahon had not yet fully grasped the dire need to get with the times.
Austin, already a dynamite in-ring worker and personality, became a short-lived sensation during a brief ECW excursion between stints in the big time. He sent up Hulk Hogan and eviscerated Eric Bischoff in awesome shoot-slanting promos, but in the WWF, Vince McMahon repackaged him as the Ringmaster - a purposefully dry technician paired with a mouthpiece in Ted DiBiase.
It could (and a year earlier, perhaps would) have been worse for Austin - he didn't become an evil dentist - but it was an almost insulting waste of his talents. Austin, in a premonition of the collaborative environment that the WWF would later become, petitioned for and sought a shift in character. His then-wife suggested the new name "Stone Cold" for his sociopathic bad-ass persona.
Austin needed no further intervention to put it over; after impressing in his series with Savio Vega, Austin replaced Curtain Call fall guy Triple H as winner of 1996's King Of The Ring tournament. He won it and proceeded to cut a legendary promo. In it, he created a groundbreaking catchphrase and an equally progressive anti-hero gimmick.
The rise of Austin 3:16 was crucial to the mainstream boom two years later; the promo earmarked him as a future WWF Champion elect, and the catchphrase precipitated a pared-back, black and white merchandise revolution.