Rob Van Dam Recalls Facing Shawn Michaels in 2002, People Seeing It As a Dream Match

Rob Van Dam faced Shawn Michaels when the latter returned to WWE in 2002, and he recently recalled his experiences with HBK and more. RVD talked about the match on his 1 Of a Kind podcast, and you can see some highlights below (per Wrestling Inc):

On treating the match like any other bout: “I remember specifically, a conversation with Stephanie McMahon and it was after everybody had picked my brain to see how I felt … She said, ‘Is this a dream match for you? Do you have dream matches?’ I felt I had enough of a relationship with her that I could open up and talk and I said, ‘I don’t get it, why is everybody coming up to me, asking me this? I’m a competitor here. Have you seen the matches I’ve had for the past 12, 18 months?’ I was wondering about how this match is gonna be. If the match wasn’t great that’s on him. He’s the one with the bad back … I didn’t get it. Admittedly, now as I say that, it sounds a little bit disrespectful on my part.”

On Michaels’ negative reputation at the time: “I feel like I’ve heard [Shawn talk about his reputation]. I didn’t know him before ’98 to compare but … when I was there, he wasn’t that horrible, sh*tty person that he was rumored to have been before, so I tend to believe he did grow.”