Bret Hart & Steve Austin Talk About Their WrestleMania 13 Match

Steve Austin and Bret Hart were guests on E&C’s Pod Of Awesomeness (via WrestleInc), and spoke about their WrestleMania 13 submission match in great detail. Here are the highlights…

Austin on How He Heard About The Match: “I’ll never forget before WrestleMania 13 happened, it was two weeks before the match, I believe,” Austin recalled. “I’m in San Antonio [Texas] watching Monday Night RAW, and, all-of-a-sudden, I see it announced that it’s going to be Bret ‘Hitman’ Hart versus ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin in a submission match and I was livid because I am not a submission-style wrestler. I got dropped on my head and I turned into a brawler. I was starting to become somewhat hot as a [babyface], but prided myself on being a heel. All-of-a-sudden, I’m going into this match with Bret ‘Hitman’ Hart, which I loved that, but the submission part, totally threw me. And I voiced my concerns to Vince McMahon because I truly thought they were putting me in a compromising position because I’m not a submission wrestler. Everybody knows I hold had three or four moves and the rest were racking the eyes, ball shots, and stuff like that, so this match was not going to be catered to me. I thought we were going to stink the joint out, I truly did. And we did everything but that. We ripped it apart with a five-star performance.”

Hart on McMahon’s Vision For The Match: “I think we have to give Vince [McMahon] credit for the vision of the submission match.” Hart continued, “I was like Steve. I thought it was really going to be a bad, bad match for us to showcase our talents. If anything it should have just been a rematch period. A submission match limited us or at least I thought. And I felt the same way as Steve, but I also knew going in there that Vince started to want to turn me heel. And I could tell even going into that over the last few months. That’s when the fans started to take to the heels a lot more. I don’t know if it was ECW or what, but I remember the heels started to get over and they started to cheer Steve a lot because he was sort of a cool heel to take a liking to.”

Hart on His Concerns For The Match: “Going into WrestleMania, I knew from my own experience with Bob Backlund, I think I had an ‘I Quit’ match with him at WrestleMania 11, which was probably my worst pay-per-view match I ever had, no offense to Bob.” Hart explained, “it wasn’t Bob’s fault either. Submission matches are a death sentence. You take out half of the fun of false finishes with pinfalls. I mean, that’s why more spots you can do. It cuts your match in half as far as what you can do.”

Austin on the match Holding Up Today: “With all the flip, flop, and flying going on now, this match, although it was done at WrestleMania 13… all these years later, this match still holds up whether it was back then, right now, or in the future because of the physicality, because of the intensity,” Austin said. “There’s nothing crazy that goes on in this match, but because it’s so real, it will hold up to the test of time.”