8 Sharpest Hustlers In Wrestling
2. Vince McMahon
The consummate wrestling promoter, Vincent Kennedy McMahon isn't quite the genius that his publicity machine styles him to be, but the fact that even many of his enemies still believe it is a significant testimony to the power of his persuasive abilities. McMahon was as unscrupulous in the mid-to-late 1980s as Eric Bischoff was in the mid-to-late 90s, and as devious as Paul Heyman has ever been.
Despite that, Bischoff and McMahon are the ones with the bad reputations, and Vince McMahon is the one credited with creating two wrestling boom periods, Hulkamania and the Attitude Era. History is indeed written by the victors, and WWE's version of pro-wrestling history remains for many, many people the only narrative.
Madusa and Bischoff are castigated for taking the WWF Women's Championship to WCW and humiliating the WWF? Vince did it first, when he brought NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair to the WWF when he still held the title, metaphorically and literally. Bischoff is blasted for talent raids? McMahon masterminded gutting half the promotions in North America for their finest performers in the eighties. McMahon had arena management across the USA sign exclusivity contracts preventing them from hosting UWF, AWA and NWA shows. He ran the very first Survivor Series against the NWA's Starrcade on Thanksgiving 1987, telling cable providers that anyone who ran Starrcade that night wouldn't receive WrestleMania IV in 1988: most of them gave in to him, and the following year Starrcade ran in December.
As the Mr. McMahon character, Vince was the most evil, tyrannical authority figure that wrestling had ever seen, a cartoon monster version of every horrible boss anyone had ever had, and one of the key movers on WWF television for the eventual rise of the Attitude Era and the pre-eminence of the WWF over WCW.