10 Times Vince McMahon Allowed Smoking On WWE TV
6. Pat Patterson
Pat has been known as Vince’s right-hand man forever, with Vince considering him one of the greatest minds in sports-entertainment history. And rightfully so, he created the Royal Rumble. Easily the most exciting match in WWE’s calendar all year. Don’t believe me? Go search Royal Rumble reaction or returns or review on YouTube.
He was also known as a notorious smoker behind the scenes. In the beginning days of the WWF the only creative team that booked some of the most historic and memorable matches and moments in wrestling history were Pat, Vince and Bruce Prichard, all sat by Vince’s pool. Bruce has joked Pat would walk away and go smoke a cigarette and when he came back Vince would remark ‘Damn it Patrick you smell like smoke!’ Pat’s mentioned “Over the years, Vince has always tried to get me to stop smoking."
Big Show has told the story of the night he debuted at St. Valentine's Day Massacre: In Your House when Pat happily ribbed him.
“Valentine’s Day Massacre, right? We’re in Memphis. So I’m sitting there with Jack Lanza and Pat, first day. I had a t-shirt with a pocket and my Marlboro Lights were in it. Jack goes, ‘oh, you smoke?’ Pat goes, ‘oh, you smoke!’ I’m like, ‘yeah, oh yeah.’ I said, ‘have a cigarette.’ Yeah, so they light up and I’m just sitting there, puffing away, thinking, and we’re talking. And Lanza’s talking to me and Pat takes a couple of puffs, goes over to the toilet and flushes it, sits down. Pat starts talking to me. Jack takes a couple of puffs, goes over to the toilet, throws it in the water, and flushes it. I’m puffing away and Vince walks in a whole room full of smoke [and] I’m the only one smoking. I didn’t want to be a stooge and tell on them because I’m not a stooge. I went, ‘I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t know.’ At the time, I’m like, ‘I’m not going to rat my buddies out.’ And then, later, I was like, ‘them sons of bitches set me up!'”
Pat has great deal of leeway and subscribes to the philosophy of calling things on the fly as opposed to overly scripting. No more evident than on the Raw, Jan. 4, 1999 edition of Raw when Mr. McMahon and Shane O Mac forced the corporate stooges Pat Patterson & Gerald Brisco to compete against Kane. Pat immediately tried to hightail it out the ring but Kane cornered him. Pat begged and pleaded with Kane, hilariously improvising trying to bribe The Big Red Machine with a cigarette to no avail, before getting chokeslammed.
It’s good to be friends with the boss.