Thursday, September 23, 2004

Revenge on Triple H
This attack set The Game too far and the stage was set to even the score. August 25, 2002, Summerslam, the confrontation between HBK Shawn Michaels and Triple H. This match was a Street Fight, a Non-Sanctioned one. In a brutal and first-ever encounter, a huge upset came. After four years of being shelved, the Heartbreak Kid defeated a fresh Triple H by pin to even his score. When everybody thought that things couldn't get more brutal after the use of tables, chairs, and ladders, it did. Triple H, embarassed by getting beaten by Shawn Michaels hit Michaels several times in the back with a sledgehammer. This beating sent Michaels too far that he had to be wheeled out of the arena on a stretcher. No one saw the Heartbreak Kid again while Triple H was having the time of his life after being handed the World Title by Eric Bischoff. Weeks prior to Survivor Series, HBK returned and laid it down plain and simple, "Count me in at Survivor Series."


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Wednesday, September 22, 2004

HBK After the nWo
At Vengeance 2002, HBK entered the ring and confronted his longtime friend Triple H. The two reuinted that night and on the next night on Raw, D-Generation-X came back in their colors. However, it was a night of backstabbing for HBK. While celebrating their unison, Triple H beat Michaels and signified that the old days are gone. DX is no longer and as far as HBK goes, he doesn't give a damn. Michaels also suffered an even more brutal backstage attack, an attack that Triple H kindly admitted.


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Tuesday, September 21, 2004

HBK After the Old WWF
After his 2000 resignation, no one saw the Heartbreak Kid for a long time. As 2002 kicked in, HBK began to re-appear in the radar screens again by appearing at WWF New York in the night of the Royal Rumble. By this time, WCW Talents were still infesting WWE - the aftermath of that melee that the two organization had that WWE won. On June 3, 2002 in Dallas, nWo Member Kevin Nash came out to the ring. He said, "There's a new member to the nWo, ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to the new member to the nWo." After this statement, a familiar tune hit - the vintage Sexy Boy Theme Music. Mixed reactions emanated from the huge crowd and Dallas, cheers and jeers were shared. Cheers because the legend was back, jeers because he was joining the nWo. HBK was a big-time force in the nWo even though it soon folded.


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Monday, September 20, 2004

HBK after 1998
When HBK Shawn Michaels lost the WWE Championship at WrestleMania XIV in Boston to Stone Cold Steve Austin, he was forced into in-ring retirment. This was due to the severe back injury that he sustained during his Royal Rumble 1998 Casket Match Title Defense against the Undertaker.

After being shelved, he returned to the company as the commissioner late that year. On January 12, 1999, Michaels underwent life-threatening back surgery. His role as commissioner included influential highlights in the title. For example, HBK reversed the WrestleMania XV Main-Event from being a WWE Champion The Rock-1999 Royal Rumble Winner Vince McMahon Title Match to a Rock-Austin Title Match. Michaels also served as the Special Guest Referee in the HHH-Rock Ironman Match at Judgment Day 2000. The night after on Raw, HBK resigned and was replaced by Mick Foley.


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Sunday, September 19, 2004

The Last Match
Many people felt that Shawn would be unable to defend the world title at WrestleMania XIV against Stone Cold but he made it and delivered yet again. This match was hyped unbelievably for a couple of reasons. It was the last big match in Shawn's career so the WWF went all out in building up a good storyline. Austin and Michaels were the two wrestlers in the business which led to an unbelievable PPV buyrate but there was something else that helped their cause. The WWF brought in the $2 million nutcase Mike Tyson to be a part of this classic match. Tyson was playing the role of enforcer/referee in the match. He brought in interest from non wrestling fans to see what Tyson would do. Prior to the match it appeared that Tyson had joined Shawn in DX as Shawn attempted to "stack the deck" against Austin. As you all know, Austin won the match in what was a relatively clean match. Even though Shawn did not win the match he still put in a tremendous effort. He could not bump the way he used to and at several points in the match you could see him wincing in pain. This put an end to Shawn's in ring career. He put the deserving man over and he walked away without any regrets. Although he didn't win his last match, I have no trouble saying that Shawn Michaels went out on top like the true champion that he is.

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Saturday, September 18, 2004

Injury that ened it all
After winning the title at Survivor Series '97, Shawn retained the title at the December '97 PPV against Ken Shamrock. At Royal Rumble '98, Shawn once again defeated the Undertaker in a casket match at the Royal Rumble thanks to Kane again. During the casket match Shawn took a bump that would end up forcing him to retire from full time in ring competition. He took a bump on his back that caused him excruciating pain. He had suffered a major problem with the lower disks in his back forcing him to cut back on his schedule drastically. It is believed that the injury occurred when the Undertaker tossed Shawn over the top rope causing Shawn to land on the corner of the wooden coffin. It is one of those injuries that looks as bad as it sounds. Remarkably, Shawn was able to wrestle another fifteen minutes and finish the match. His career, however, would come to an end a few months later.

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Friday, September 17, 2004

The names of Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels will always be linked together due to their relationship on WWF television and their supposed hatred for eachother out of the ring. Shawn was the man who ended up defeating Bret in what was Bret's last match in the WWF at Survivor Series '97. It was probably the most controversial moment in the history of wrestling. By now, I think every wrestling fan knows the outcome of this match. Shawn had Bret in Bret's finishing maneuver, The Sharpshooter, when WWF owner Vince McMahon told the timekeeper to "ring the f**king bell." The scheduled finish for the match was supposed to see Bret's family members run in and cause a DQ. However, Vince McMahon changed that outcome without telling Bret thus providing wrestling fans with what many people believe to be the "biggest screwjob in wrestling history." The whole thing is detailed on the Wrestling with Shadows documentary.

Whatever role Shawn Michaels played in this match is unknown to this day. The only ones that really know are Vince McMahon, Bret Hart and Shawn himself. In my opinion it really does not matter what role, if any, Shawn played in this whole situation. It was an issue between an employee, Bret, and his boss, Vince. Sure, Shawn could have been in on it but does it really matter what role Shawn played in this whole thing? It is something between Vince and Bret so instead of sitting here and speculating on the behaviour of Michaels I think it would be best if I just moved on.

One thing we do know is that Shawn and Bret did not like eachother during Bret's last year in the WWF. The biggest reason is probably because of the perception that Shawn refused to job to Bret at WrestleMania 13 as originally scheduled. To add heat to an already hot fire, the two men often made shoot (meaning real) comments about one another on camera. The rivalry came to a head in June '97 when Shawn and Bret apparently participated in a pull apart brawl backstage at a WWF show. Although the relationship between the two deteriorated in the summer of '97 it seemed as though they were able to look past their differences. By the time Survivor Series '97 came around they were on good enough terms that they were willing to change in the same dressing room. In recent interviews, Bret has said that he really doesn't blame Shawn for everything that happened because, in Bret's view, everything Shawn did was because of the orders of Vince McMahon. Nobody really knows what the relationship between Shawn and Bret is today but I doubt that any of you will be seeing them having a drink in your local bar. In the battle between Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels I think it's pretty obvious that Shawn was the winner out of the ring AND in the ring.

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Thursday, September 16, 2004

D Generation-X
"The icon. The showstopper. The main event." Those are the phrases used to describe Shawn during his DX days. There are many questions as to when DX was officially born. The first time Shawn and Triple H wrestled on the same team was on Raw in the middle of August '97. It was a tag match that saw Shawn and Triple H taking on their rivals at the time, the Undertaker and Mick Foley. Therefore, the unofficial beginning of DX was on the August 18, 1997 edition of Raw. Following that tag match, Shawn and Triple H appeared on camera together often although the name Degeneration X did not debut on WWF TV until October '97. If my memory serves me correctly, Bret called Shawn and Hunter degenerates (another word would be wicked or immoral). The term degenerate was coined by WWF hater Phil Mushnick and that word was the one he used to describe fans of the WWF. Chyna and the late Rick Rude later joined the group although Shawn and Triple H were the only ones that actually wrestled at the time.

Shawn Michaels defeated the British Bulldog at the UK PPV "One Night Only" for the European title on September 20, 1997 making him the first grand slam champion in federation history. He beat the Bulldog in his own country and then went on to heat up his feud with Bret Hart.

Bret was a big time heel in his role where he bashes America in every speech while HBK was attempting to be a heel by doing cheap tactics and basically anything for the win. This was one of the things that led to the downfall of Bret Hart. It is believed that the European belt was given to Shawn because Vince McMahon wanted to punish Bret for refusing to do the job at Survivor Series '97. Since The Bulldog is Bret's brother-in-law, McMahon felt that by punishing Bret's family member it would lead to Bret changing his stance on the Montreal finish. Shawn walked away with the title even though he was never scheduled to win the belt in the first place.

Meanwhile, Degeneration X was growing on people quickly. They were doing such a good job as heels that Shawn had vaulted himself over Bret in terms of being the number one heel in the company. This caused a lot of tension between Shawn and Bret because Bret was promised the spot as the #1 heel because he was willing to do the anti-American angle.

Before the famed Survivor Series '97 match, Shawn wrestled in a match that was just as memorable as the more popular Montreal match. It was the first ever Hell in a Cell match against the Undertaker at the October '97 PPV called Badd Blood. This match changed Shawn's career forever as he proved yet again that he was the best man to introduce a gimmick match. Just like he proved during the ladder match in '94, Shawn was able to produce another five star performance in a gimmick match that nobody had seen previously. He took a huge bump when he fell from three quarters high up the cage onto an announce table that waited about 10 feet below. He ended up winning the match, thanks to the debut of Kane, in what was one of the most brutal matches anybody has ever seen. For the fourth year in a row Shawn delivered one of the greatest matches in wrestling history. Without Shawn, ladder matches and HIAC matches would not exist. He set the trend and now everybody is doing their best to follow the model provided by the greatest wrestler to ever grace a WWF ring.

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Wednesday, September 15, 2004

Stone Cold and HBK form one hell of a team !
Although Shawn missed a few months with a knee injury he came back as a force to form an impromptu tag team with Stone Cold Steve Austin. At the time, Shawn was a face and Austin was quickly becoming the most popular wrestler ever so the team was over huge. During an episode of Raw on May 25, 1997 they teamed up to take the tag straps away from long time champions, Owen Hart and the British Bulldog. It was one of the greatest tag team matches in the history of Raw due to the fact that it lasted nearly 20 minutes with a ton of heat and featured four workers who were very good.

At King of the Ring '97, a year after Austin won KOTR, the tag team champions participated in a one on one match. As far as I know, this was the only one on one PPV match that these two had against eachother when they were healthy. It ended up being a short match that ended in a no contest finish that I am still complaining about to this day! I understand the WWF's position at the time because they did not want either man to do job. I assume that they felt that Michaels and Austin had several other PPV battles ahead of them but sadly that never came to pass. Due to Shawn's back injury and Austin's neck injury the only other time they wrestled against each other one on one was at WrestleMania XIV in what turned out to be Shawn's last WWF match.

In July, the team was stripped of the titles because of Shawn’s real life backstage fight with Bret Hart. On camera, they said he had an injury to cover it up. He sat out of the Canadian Stampede PPV in July '97 due to the bogus injury. The main event of Stampede was a ten men tag where Shawn was rumored to be pinned which forced his critics to once again claim that he was avoiding doing a J.O.B. Although the Austin/Michaels team did not last for a long time it was fantastic to see two of the best wrestlers of all time on the same team.

At Summerslam in August '97 he played the role of referee in the Hart/Undertaker world title match when he "accidentally" cost the Undertaker the match. This was when he turned heel, this was when he released the monster known as DX.

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Tuesday, September 14, 2004

His secound title run is very short!
During an edition of Raw in February '97 Shawn Michaels "lost his smile" on Thursday Raw Thursday. He went on the show and forfeited the world title. His reason was that he had a knee injury although some people, like Bret Hart, believed that he could have worked through it. Bret was upset about it because Shawn was scheduled to drop the title to Bret at WrestleMania XIII to return the job Bret did to Shawn the previous year. He missed the PPVs in February, March, April and May due to the knee injury and various other injuries that nagged him throughout his career.


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