Remember that Time Kevin Owens Head-Butted Vince McMahon – LOL

So, umm, do you all remember that time Kevin Owens head-butted Vince McMahon and everyone went crazy! Peoples were actually excited for some kind of perceived narrative change or shift in “booking” – as they say – away from the dumb and towards the cool. Suddenly, the WWE figured out exactly what to do with this amazing talent they’d been wasting for years – and that required the revolutionary idea of having him beat up Vince McMahon and feud with son Shane! Oh… LOL… my sides are hurting. How’d all that work out so far, anyways?

That “monumental” and “career-defining” moment for Kevin Owens that shocked the wrestling world is already long forgotten. And guess what, that was only 2 months ago. Feels like 2 years ago, doesn’t it?

How so much can change in such a short span of time… or should I say, how little things actually change. And this is despite the overwhelming punditry praise for this “historic” moment.

Just to single one out, let’s look at Ryan Dilbert’s Bleacher Report article:
Kevin Owens Nails Career-Defining Moment with Vince McMahon on WWE Smackdown

Here Dilbert makes this claim – one that was pretty common to his reporting ilk at the time:

“If there was any lingering doubt about whether Owens could thrive as an elite WWE heel, he smashed it with a swift headbutt on Tuesday night.”

And then adds this 2017-media style doozy at the end:

“Austin had the famous 3:16 speech. Shawn Michaels had the barbershop attack. Years from now, we will look back at Owens devouring Vince for all the world to see as his own career-defining moment.”

But it wasn’t just this article, of course, everyone wanted to be the first to jump to the conclusion that we’d just seen one of the greatest moments of our lives play out!

That same articles quotes these great Twitter responses, like this one from Miami Herald Wrestling writer Scott Fishman:

My God…Has Kevin Owens been made or what? More than ever. I can't get over how great that was. #WWE #SDLive

— Scott Fishman (@smFISHMAN) September 13, 2017

And another one from the website Wrestleview:

They are going so hard with Kevin Owens right now, one of the best endings to a #WWE TV show in years by far #SDLive

— Wrestleview.com (@wrestleview) September 13, 2017

Is there room for opinion retractions in the media, I mean, is that a thing? I’m assuming not. I think maybe that’s just called “forgetting”.

Let’s go back now to the Survivor Series. The man who was “elevated” to “elite” heel status, was now on the pre-show in a meaningless, lifeless, heat-less tag team match against (low) comedy act Breeze-ango. But even better, 4 hours later, Owens AND his partner Zayn, “interfered” deep into the main event to attack Shane McMahon, a 50-year-old non-wrestler rich guy who’d taken a ton of damage already. Owens and his partner were not only ineffectual at causing any extra damage to Shane, they also played no part in his elimination from the match, and were both run off by this old guy and his chair. Literally, they ran away in fear. And then, Stephanie McMahon, two months removed from her father being brutalized, is shaking Owens’ hand and recruiting him back to RAW. LOL.

And how did the audience react to all this? – Yawn.

So yeah, we can assume not only do few people even remember that “head-butt heard around the world” any more, but honestly they didn’t care in the first place.

I’m not shocked. The reactionary hyperbole of today’s culture is hilarious and confusing. To think head-butting the 72-year-old owner of the company – and a former doo-rag wearing hardcore ECW Champion nonetheless – who’s pretty much done every ridiculous and insane thing in WWE history, would somehow help the career narrative of a guy who six months earlier was distracted by entrance music and thus defeated in seconds by a non-wrestling Goldberg, in the main event of a PPV for Owen’s Universal Title. LOL… but, no, that was cool – right – because it meant we’re getting Owens vs. Chris Jericho at ‘Mania in 2017…. LO-double-L!

I mean, this wasn’t like Kevin and Vince were in a street fight. This was a lifetime professional showman taking a cooperative head-butt in a WWE ring. Vince putting guys over by trying to look like a somewhat pathetic old guy who gets assaulted by younger, scary wrestlers isn’t new by the way. In 2011 he let the Nexus do it, in 2013 it was Brock, and in 2015 Roman Reigns. So, when Owens did it in 2017, no one remembered those past attacks, and when, like, Mike Kanellis does it in 2019, no one is gonna remember the Owens head-butt either.

At the time, all we heard about this head-butt was how fantastic this was for Owens’ “storyline” and “character”. Well, no one was saying that kind of meta-shit when Shawn Michaels super-kicked Marty Jannetty through the barbershop window, or when Austin gave his 3:16 speech. Fans hated them at the time, almost with a kind of seething lethargy. But they were able to move on to become mega-stars because those moments were just one aspect of a sustained creative push in an era of patience and naive fan engagement.

Guess what, the WWE still does this. It’s just not with the wrestlers YOU like. Nah, it’s with the sports entertainers that the fans “hate” – and I think that’s the point. Randy Orton, John Cena, Roman Reigns, even Brock Lesnar, are characters that in the “reality era” have enjoyed long, sustained creative pushes in the face of angry and naive fans. That’s right, because they’ve been “getting over” on YOU by teasing the shit you want, like Kevin Owens as a old-man head-butting badass, when all along they’ve never wavered from the real 2-year plan of paying off Roman Reigns vs. Brock Lesnar at Wrestlemania. I mean, it’s not like… what, oh shit, you thought this was all somehow leading to Owens main event-ing Wrestlemania? LOL!

Well, are you angry bro? Because if so, NOW you know how it felt to be a fan in the audience in 1996 when Stone Cold beat the hell out of our beloved recovery-legend preacher Jake ‘the Snake’ Roberts, or in 1992 when jerk-ass Shawn Michaels betrayed his happy and genuine long-time friend by throwing him through a pane of glass. WWE is just playing a different game on you now, but it still fucking works.