[1996-02-26-WWF-Raw] Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels & Roddy Piper

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Piper makes the Bret/Shawn main event at Wrestlemania a 60-minute Ironman match. And Vince sure does love it when Shawn lowers his tights to show off his abs. Could Vince have possibly laid on the Shawn love any thicker?

[Robert S]

The Michaels and Bret stuff here was dying a horrible death, a five minute tirade of two guys saying "I respect you, but I think I am a bit better than you" is not what sells PPVs (or even keep TV viewers). Piper at least brought some fire into this, though I would not say he saved the segment.

[Resident Evil]

I still remember watching this from 1996. I obviously loved the segment because it's still in my memory. Personally, it did a great job for me in setting up Wrestlemania XII

[Kevin Ridge]

Piper mentions he doesn't like the crowd booing Bret. I wasn't hearing them myself. Bret talks about a tough five months lately getting beat up by tall guys. Shawn responds that he got beat up by nine guys. Anyways, Piper doesn't want the title match to end in some type of fluke. So he sets up a one hour Ironman match. Both Shawn and Bret are cool with that.

[PeteF3]

God, with Vince out of the booth even Lawler has to gush about the reaction Shawn's getting, though he tries to play it off in that Bobby Heenan "make fun of a guy and put him over at the same time" manner. Shawn and Bret play mutual admiration, with the crowd not exactly thrilled with Bret. This is a typical WWF babyface vs. babyface yawner of a segment until Piper comes out and injects some passion and energy into things. I liked Piper shitting on the idea of Shawn showing off his abs as proof of great condition. He doesn't want a DQ or a copout finish or a fluke, so he makes it an Ironman Match.

[soup23]

I liked this segment overall but the feud was destined to be lackluster with the announced stip and them having to play up this ultimate respect thing. Piper knows how to sell face vs. face as we saw at Mania 8 and he interjects well here.

[tim]

Lawler filling in for Vince's usual gushing over Michaels was hilarious, and he was able to some extent to keep character with it. Watching this segment, this match up doesn't seem that big to me. I can't say I'm looking forward to revisiting the Iron Man match as I go into March.

[dawho5]

A lot of this was really awkward.  But most babyface vs. babyface stuff is without some hint of a turn.  The being said, both Shawn and Diesel ahve been acting more than heelish enough to turn despite the fact that the crowd has failed to notice on both counts.  So strange.