WWE: 10 Most Shocking Moments In Wrestling

6. The Montreal Screwjob

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeTPQsBsE9Y Say the word €˜Montreal€™ to any wrestling fan, and there is only one thing that they think of: the infamous double cross on Bret Hart at the Survivor Series 1997. The WWF, as it was then called, was in the midst of a heated war with rivals WCW. Nothing seemed to be out of bounds. Top WWF stars were poached by WCW. Pre-taped WWF results were revealed on live WCW broadcasts. Vince McMahon was in trouble like he€™d never been in before. In an attempt to secure his top star, Bret Hart, he offered Hart an unprecedented 20 year deal in 1996. It would mean that Hart would be an active wrestler for another three years, before taking up a backstage role as an agent, sharing his wisdom with a new generation of stars. However, the WWF was struggling financially and could not afford to honour the contract any longer, meaning that Hart could negotiate with WCW. He came to an agreement with them, and his WWF contract was set to expire in December 1997. However, Hart was still the WWF Champion and McMahon needed him to drop the title before jumping to WCW. At Survivor Series 1997 in Montreal, he was defending his title against Shawn Michaels, a man he legitimately despised in real life. They had had a backstage brawl earlier in the year, and had both deviated from scripted promos to make veiled barbs at each other during the summer. McMahon wanted Hart to lose to Michaels. Hart didn€™t want to lose the title in his home country of Canada, and certainly didn€™t want to lose to Michaels, and with a creative control clause in his WWF contract, there was little McMahon could do if Hart didn€™t want to play ball. So he decided to conspire with Michaels and referee Earl Hebner to double-cross Hart. The internet was starting to be used by more and more people by 1997, and as Hart made his way down the aisle, a sizeable chunk of those in attendance and those watching on PPV were aware of the behind-the-scenes wrangles and contract issues that were happening away from the ring. The match played on the real life issues and was a disjointed, heated brawl with several WWF officials and McMahon himself at ringside. The result that Hart believed would happen, a disqualification, never occurred. Instead, while Michaels locked Hart into his own submission finisher, the Sharpshooter, Hebner signalled for the bell despite the fact that Hart had never submitted. Michaels feigned innocence and was rushed backstage. Hart realised what had happened, spat in McMahon€™s face, wrote the letters €˜WCW€™ in the air with his fingers and smashed up the ringside area. As word spread about what had really happened, wrestling€™s thin veil of legitimacy was finally blown wide open. It soon became apparent to anyone who had ever questioned it, that wrestling was pre-determined, because at Montreal, there were two pre-determined finishes, one fed to Hart, and one to Michaels and Hebner. Anyone who wanted to understand the controversy would have to expose themselves to the pre-determined nature of the business. The heel €˜Mr McMahon€™ character was born out of this event, and the Vince Russo style of kayfabe-busting booking also came out of this. Montreal killed the magic of wrestling for a lot of people, but with the advent of the Internet, it was going to happen one way or another at some point in time.