On a recent edition of his Grilling JR podcast, legendary wrestling announcer Jim Ross and co-host Conrad Thompson discussed how Ross was a frequent target of former WWE Chairman Vince McMahon’s mocking
and jokes — both on-screen and off.
JR theorized that McMahon targeted him because Vince was jealous because “he was never the play-by-play guy that” Ross was. The WWE Hall of Famer and current part-time AEW announcer also ran Talent Relations for McMahon’s company during the Monday Night War era, and Ross thinks McMahon doesn’t want him to get ”any credit for helping build the Attitude Era into what it was”.
Attitude Era star Matt Hardy seems to have a different theory. He covered it on the latest edition of his The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy podcast:
“I mean, I felt like Vince had a thing. Vince had a thing for putting people in positions that made them feel uncomfortable, and he kind of got off on that, in all honesty. That was like one of his things. And I felt like he did that with JR quite a bit. That became a regular, common thing there.
“There were certain people I felt like, if you ever showed signs of weakness or said, ‘No, I don’t want to do that,’ or if you were outright uncomfortable with it, then he would push it even harder. I know there are some people that did get that.
“I feel like anytime he put us in positions where—and I feel like sometimes he said—’if you don’t go into areas or positions where you feel uncomfortable, you will never grow.’ And in some ways, that is true. But in some ways too, I think he was abusive with it as well.
“And JR probably was one of the guys he was more abusive with in many, many ways. There was this real weird rivalry between them in some ways.”
Anyone else think Hardy’s theory might be brought up if Janel Grant’s sex trafficking lawsuit against McMahon and WWE ever gets to trial?
h/t: noDQ.com for transcription
