Ken Shamrock On How Shawn Michaels Treated Him During The Attitude Era, Working With The Rock

Former WWE Superstar Ken Shamrock recently appeared on the Wrestling Life Online podcast, where he opened up about his experiences working with several prominent talents at the time, including Shawn Michaels and The Rock.

Shamrock wrestled The Heartbreak Kid a few weeks after the infamous Montreal Screwjob at December 7’s D-Generation X: In Your House pay-per-view in the main event for the WWF Championship.

He also had a memorable feud with The Rock in 1998 over the Intercontinental Championship. The veteran was full of praise for both HBK and The Final Boss in the interview.

Check out the highlights below:

Ken Shamrock on his experience working with Shawn Michaels

While HBK wasn’t really a likable personality backstage during the 1990s, Ken Shamrock had no such problems working with the current NXT head booker. However, he did say that he could see why other people had issues with Shawn at the time. The veteran also said that the current version of HBK is the “real Shawn.”

“Shawn Michaels was, from all the things I heard—I never saw it. We were great together. He was pleasant to me. He was respectful to me. But again, I can see some of the things that unfolded, um, where I could see why people would say those things about Shawn. But I think the real Shawn, I think we see now today. I think we now see who he really is. And I think he is a good guy,” he said.

Shamrock continued:

“He made a tremendous decision, you know. He’s definitely able to be comfortable because he did so many great things in wrestling, and he made so many people happy, and he really helped a lot of people get through a lot of hard times because of the joy he brought to people. So, those are the things that I think he could truly hang his hat on, and he could really, really use that popularity that he was able to gain through that character to really help a lot of people understand, you know, having a life of fulfillment and what that looks like.”

On working with The Rock

When asked about his experience working with The Rock, Ken Shamrock said that he figured out during the initial days of them working together that Dwayne Johnson had a different mindset compared to others and that he was destined for greatness.

“Yeah, you know, he was another one. You sat down, and you could tell immediately that his mind was different than anyone else’s. The way he saw things, how he put the matches together, and being able to tie in what I did to what he does. Being able to have those differences swerve when it came to finishes or even in between, in the middle of the match, where you want to pick it up and drop it real quick. He just had that mindset that he would see things before they happened,” he said.

Ken Shamrock continued:

“I saw it right away; the mindset was there, and he started to develop that as we were doing our matches together. He started feeling very comfortable and confident in the direction where his character was gonna go. The minute they got him out of the Nation, the minute they handed him the mic, the stars went off. It was just unbelievable. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a transformation like that in my life, where literally, they just handed him the mic and it was game over.”

Please credit the Wrestling Life Online podcast and give an H/T to 411Mania if you take quotes from this article.