JBL Calls USA Network’s Outrage Over the Brian Pillman Gun Angle ‘Fake’

John “Bradshaw” Layfield doesn’t believe USA Network was caught off guard by the infamous Brian Pillman gun angle with Steve Austin. On the latest episode of Something to Wrestle, Conrad Thompson looked back at late 1996, when WWF moved Raw’s start time up to get ahead of Nitro and aired the taped segment that drew heat from the network. JBL said the angle was a sign of how desperate the company was while losing to WCW, called the network’s reaction “faux outrage,” and questioned why a gun was treated differently from other violent angles in wrestling. You can check out his comments below:

On WWF Trying To Compete With WCW:

“I think you’re just pulling out all the stops to try. Like I say, we’re on the ropes, and we’re taking every punch, and we’re not throwing any back. And so we’re trying anything that’ll work. So what are we going to do? We’re going to front-run them. Go out there three minutes early; I remember when that happened. I’m thinking we’re doing the best we can.

“And then the gun angle, same thing. We’re just trying to create something where people will turn the channel and come to us and at least see what’s going on. I don’t know what people thought about the gun angle back then. I thought it was fine. It’s either a work or it isn’t. People say, ‘Oh, it’s a work, but I don’t like this because that looked real.’ I thought it was fine then. I don’t know how far you’re supposed to go. Maybe that’s a bridge too far. I don’t know, but it certainly created some controversy.”

On Who Took the Blame Over the Brian Pillman:

“It was taped, so obviously you can’t blame it on being live TV, which is what you did a lot. It was a great circular role of, ‘Who takes the blame?’ Typically, what would happen was somebody would say they’re going to do something in their promo. Vince would go, ‘Yeah, go out there and do it,’ and then they’d go out there and do it. USA would call Vince and go, ‘Hey, what are they doing? What are you doing? You can’t say this on live television.’ And Vince would say, ‘Oh, well, he was just a performer that was out there and just got a little carried away.’ ‘Okay, well, talk to him, please.’ It’s just a circular way of everybody passing the blame.

“USA knew what was going on. At least, my understanding is that they did. But you had to blame somebody. Everybody had to blame somebody, and somewhere down there at the end it was, ‘Hey, talent just got carried away.’ You can’t say that on a taped show. This is something that was obviously planned, edited, and shown like you want it, because it’s a taped show. And yeah, USA got hot about it, but I don’t think there’s any doubt they knew about it. I mean, come on. We’re getting killed by WCW, and so I think a lot of this was faux outrage. You’d want to put something out there and distance yourself from it, and then they can blame it on those crazy wrestlers, and then Vince can blame it on the guys doing something spontaneously, whatever it is. So did I think it was out of line? I think wrestling’s a work, and so no, I didn’t. I don’t know how far you can go. If you had just shot somebody, I think it might have been. I just think it might be a little different that you missed.”

On Why a Gun Was Treated Differently From Other Violent Angles:

“I’m with you. I set up Cena on a car, got in another car, and tried to kill him. I literally rammed one car into another. Now, we had a stuntman do it, so we were able to film it. I’m not sure exactly where we did it, but anyway, I set up Cena, and I tried to kill him with a car. We’ve had people run over people with cars all the time. Lawler did that way back in the day. That’s vehicular manslaughter. That’s a felony. Also, what if you killed them? I don’t understand the difference. But, ‘Oh, pull a gun out! How dare you do that? You might hurt them.’ Yeah, hitting a freaking 5,000-pound car won’t hurt them.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Something to Wrestle with a h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.