Bix Posted June 29, 2008 Report Share Posted June 29, 2008 ...he does this. A bizarre incident took place earlier tonight at the Hall of Fame dinner in Waterloo, IA. Bret Hart was giving a speech, accepting the Hall of Fame honor for father Stu. During the speech, Hart noted Greg Oliver of SlamWrestling, who was there to be given the Jim Melby Memorial Award for wrestling journalism along with writing partner Steve Johnson. Hart went off on Oliver in his speech, and started talking about the sacrifices the wrestlers have made and loved ones lost in the business and said that one of us doesn't deserve to be here and said either he goes or I go. Several of the older wrestlers in attendance gave Hart a standing ovation. Oliver didn't leave, although the report we got was that Johnson did leave to try and diffuse a bad situation. Hart eventually left when Oliver didn't, and many of the wrestlers left with him and it created an ugly vibe. Hart hasn't liked Oliver dating back to Oliver's book, "Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame: The Canadians," which listed him No. 14 in the list of greatest Canadian wrestlers ever. The book did acknowledge him as the best known of all the Canadian wrestlers but said "Hart can hardly claim to be the best ever." The situation was videotaped and I presume the tape will get around over the next few days. We hope to have more details forthcoming. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kronos Posted June 29, 2008 Report Share Posted June 29, 2008 Jeez, as if he didn't know that Trish Stratus is the greatest Canadian rassler ever. . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHawk Posted June 29, 2008 Report Share Posted June 29, 2008 Considering they've done events before, including a CAC reunion, without incident, I wonder if it's more a "you've never been in the ring thing" than a "how dare you say Killer Kowalski's better than me" thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CodySave Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 I have some friends who went to the wrestling show held the night before. I'll have to ask them if they made it to the Hall of Fame dinner and witnessed this nonsense. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeteF3 Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 According to Dave, Bret's real source of anger was something in Oliver's mostly-raving review of his autobiography. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjh Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 This is the paragraph from the book review that supposed to have most irked Bret: To anyone familiar with the documentary on the Montreal screw job, Hitman Hart: Wrestling With Shadows, there's not much new from Hart. But he takes the reader through the step-by-step process that gets him to that point, and how the "betrayal" in the ring wasn't completely unexpected. Like any other person's story, the reader must remember that this is from a single perspective, and not meant as gospel. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 I was just about to ask if anyone knew the passage. And if that's truly what irked him, yeah, that's ridiculous. Although, I will admit that I can see Bret's frustration, simply because the facts about Montreal have been out there for so long, and time has proven so many things that those involved like Michaels, McMahon, and HHH denied at the time to be true, that I don't understand how anyone can say Bret's side is just "one side of the story", when it has been confirmed by neutral people who have no special interests in either direction to be true. The whole timeline and rundown of events is one of the most easily available things about pro wrestling out there, so there's really not any excuse ten years later for people to still be saying that we don't know the whole story, because we know way too much about it as it is. Bret is a complex guy. It's hard to fault him the things he truly believes (for the most part), but at the same time, you wish he could let go of a lot of it for his own well-being. I say this as someone who thought he was pretty much 100% in the right at the time based on what happened. And even if Bret does have a point, making a big production at a banquet is silly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Morris Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 I can understand Oliver's remark to a point... not based on people not having all the facts, but simply assuming that Bret was right in every aspect of what he did. Although I do side with Bret on what went down in the ring, I don't approve of Bret punching Vince in the face... I can understand why he did it, but I don't agree with it regardless. Bret's biggest fault is that he tends to believe too strongly in himself and what he accomplished. I also suspect Bret has never been happy with the fact that his career didn't end on his own terms. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Lone Rogue Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 Isn't Oliver helping to write a Benoit Death book? Maybe theres something Bret read or heard about it that irked him. Not to say it could be Bret just wrapped up in himself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 Yeah, Bret is still nuts. I wonder if it were Dave getting the award if Bret would have gone off. Unlikely. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 I'd also say the "Melby Award" is off to a bad start: 2006 Melby 2007 Mike Chapman 2008 Greg Oliver Okay, it's cool that they gave it to Melby before he passed away. Then they gave it to the founder of the museum second, and frankly Chapman is a dogshit pro wrestling historian. Then to Greg Oliver third: http://slam.canoe.ca/SlamWrestlingBios/oliver.html Which is frankly kind of nutty. Perhaps this is like Lou Thesz "Leaving A List" of people who were going to be given awards in his name after he died... which I think was a CAC spot. Maybe Melby wrote up a list of who should be honored after he passed, and Oliver was #1 on the list. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Resident Evil Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 I can understand Oliver's remark to a point... not based on people not having all the facts, but simply assuming that Bret was right in every aspect of what he did. Although I do side with Bret on what went down in the ring, I don't approve of Bret punching Vince in the face... I can understand why he did it, but I don't agree with it regardless. Bret's biggest fault is that he tends to believe too strongly in himself and what he accomplished. I also suspect Bret has never been happy with the fact that his career didn't end on his own terms. Well, Bret did give him a warning beforehand. Not that it justifies hitting someone. From what I understand, Bret just didn't go up to Vince and punch a willing, standing still Vince. They locked up or wrestled or something for 30 seconds before Bret punched him. According to Vince himself, he has a fighting background and if what he says is true he is a very dangerous person. From that perspective, it's hard to disagree with Bret punching Vince. As far as the original Bret and Oliver topic goes, that's a story where it's impossible to know the clear, complete story. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjh Posted June 30, 2008 Report Share Posted June 30, 2008 As far as the original Bret and Oliver topic goes, that's a story where it's impossible to know the clear, complete story. I don't think we need to know the clear complete story to make a moral judgment in this case. Bret should have made it known to the organizers that Greg Oliver being honored at the ceremony was such a problem as soon as he found out about it, rather than waiting until his speech at the ceremony itself to complain where it would cause maximum embarrassment for everyone involved. And really the things Greg Oliver has written about Bret that he is so upset about rank very low in terms of nasty things people in wrestling have said about Bret Hart. I mean it says a lot about the screwed up nature of the wrestling business that Bret Hart would single out someone who treated him respectfully in all their meetings with such bile, just because he never stepped foot in the ring and had some opinions about himself he disagreed with, while being happy to play nice at WWE's Hall Of Fame induction ceremony in front of a crowd of people who had stabbed him in the back and badmouthed him for years. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjh Posted July 3, 2008 Report Share Posted July 3, 2008 Perhaps this is like Lou Thesz "Leaving A List" of people who were going to be given awards in his name after he died... which I think was a CAC spot. Maybe Melby wrote up a list of who should be honored after he passed, and Oliver was #1 on the list. That seems to be the case, given the following article by Shelley Bonin, Jim Melby's daughter, responding to the recent controversy over the award: Melby Award winners deserving of honor In 2007, the award was presented as wished by Jim to Mike Chapman, the Executive Director of the Dan Gable International Wrestling Institute and Museum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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