[1997-03-03-WWF-Raw] Interview: Steve Austin

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Austin cuts a scorching hot promo to hype the match with Bret at Wrestlemania -- his best of the year to this point.

 

"You treat me like a dog and you expect me to smile. You remind me of a jackass."

[soup23]

"How many one-legged people could go 25 minutes with three of the top wrestlers in the world" NONE! Terrific promo with Austin hyping the submission match. Austin paints himself as the underdog due to his lack of technical expertise. Stone Cold guarantee that he wont say I quit.

[Loss]

I think the best part of this is that Austin really was upset when he found out this was the match they were working at Mania. He found out when the viewing audience found out. He was probably channeling that frustration in his promo. He shared that story recently on his podcast.

 

I think Austin decided in ECW to use promos as therapy.

[Kevin Ridge]

Austin is great during this as comes off so angry for how he is being treated. This was Austin as his best on the mic and he didn't overdue the catch phrases. Calling Vince a jackass was a nice finishing touch.

[PeteF3]

Austin eviscerates Shawn Michaels before moving back to Bret Hart. In contrast to Survivor Series, Austin paints himself as a guy who doesn't know much about submissions, but plans to just beat the hell out of Bret anyway. On top of this being obviously a fantastic promo: intentional or not there was some excellent foreshadowing of the actual finish to the match here.

[Exposer]

Awesome segment. Austin is on fire here. I loved him taking a dig at Shawn Michaels. He does a great job of putting himself over & his opponents when discussing his Final Four performance working with a hurt knee. He does seem legit pissed when talking about the match stipulation. His last line is hilariously great. Made me laugh. Austin is probably the most interesting & entertaining wrestler stateside at this point in 1997.

[Superstar Sleeze]

Stone Cold is one of the all time great gimmicks. Totally unhinged and dangerous. He has that crazy look in his eye. He is unnerving but also hilarious. Great sociopathic performance.