All language subtitles for Biography WWE Legends S01 E05 (Biography.Wwe.Legends.S01e05.720P.Web.H264-Dirt.m4v) (ENGLISH)

We're going to have a
handheld and turn them around.

I mean, that way Keith's standing,
it looks like it's higher, right?

Does he do that
from the second rope?

Boom!

This job to me is the greatest
life that I could ever live.

For years, people told me that I
was too small, that I couldn't do this,

that I couldn't do that, that
I wasn't going to make it.

And I've shoved it
in everybody's face.

There's no time
out for this man.

I realized I can't be popular
with everybody all of the time.

So in the meantime, I'm going to be popular
with me, and I'm going to be the best.

There are definitely two lives of Shawn
Michaels, even as who he was before.

You will not ever in your lives see a
man more charismatic, more flamboyant,

or more talented than the
Heartbreak Kid Shawn Michaels.

The greatest in-ring...

performer...

of all time.

Being a prick doesn't
come naturally, Shawn.

It did.

As a dick.

The showstopper, the
headliner, the main event!

There was so much bad
blood between us, and I

was always like, if I
see him, I'll kill him.

I had so much anger about it.

Nobody steals my spotlight!

I want it all!

Shawn Michaels can do absolutely anything,
any style, to perfection with anyone.

When the bell rings...

No one is as good as Shawn.

I will give you a show like you
have never, ever seen before.

Why?

Because I can.

The only man to
win every major title.

You can't say
anybody was better.

But also tormentor.

It's like I'm in
self-destruct mode.

I just knew that he
didn't love himself.

There was something
in him that he despised.

You're taking pain pills
at 12 in the afternoon.

Belligerent, falling
down, staggering.

Everything that you
have in your life is this.

And it's all going away.

On more than one occasion, I really
wanted to beat the hell out of Shawn.

But I knew there was a good
man behind all this other crap.

The biggest thing that he ever did is
turning his life around to where he is now.

And so, yep, there
are two lives there.

But there's one Shawn Michaels.

The very best sports
entertainer in the world!

Shawn is a developmental brand
that grooms WWE superstars.

Any kind of count-out, DQ,
or whatever, ends the match.

There are Shawn's fingerprints
in almost every talent in NXT.

Shawn is very hands-on.

Then he sits up behind
him and then whacks!

He sold out arenas all around the
world when he was a heartbreak kid.

He's in a different
place in his life now.

He's humble.

He wants to be
behind the scenes.

It isn't about him.

He wants to help others
achieve their dreams.

You have to say it
with passion and anger.

Here we go, guys.

Three, two, one...

Seeing Shawn today, it's sometimes hard
for people to believe that Shawn Michaels.

Certain levels of talent
command certain levels of respect.

His knowledge and his
wisdom of the business

and all that stuff,
it's so valuable.

Shawn Michaels' life is a
story that I'll never forget.

And a lot of people
could relate to.

He always wanted more.

It was a life of never enough.

And then his life
totally changes.

A lot of us have that.

If we're lucky.

I think the Shawn Michaels
story is one that's really

cool and one that all of
us can stand to learn from.

I was born into
a military family.

My father was in the Air Force.

It was Michael
Shawn Hickenbottom.

But everybody in my
family called me Shawn.

My father was a pilot.

So early on, we moved a lot.

He was going to Vietnam.

We went to England.

Then Maryland.

And then we moved to Texas.

I was about eight-ish.

From that point on, I
was in the state of Texas.

You don't have long-lasting
friendships in the Air Force.

The hardest part for making
friends is having the last name.

The roll call.

Hickenbottom?

Michael Hickenbottom?

Do you hear the
snickers all over the road?

Hickenbottom?

And of course you do.

And it's like, son of a biscuit.

I wish I had a
different last name.

Shawn was well-loved.

He was always very
quiet and very shy.

Growing up, he
wasn't an extrovert.

He was just a good,
friendly, nice little boy.

And people liked him.

He was involved in
sports all of his life.

He just enjoyed
doing everything.

I was a big fan
of playing football.

Because of the contact.

You know, contact and
athletics were appealing to me.

And then I'm 12 years old, getting
to stay up late on a Saturday night.

And this wrestling show starts.

Southwest
Championship Wrestling.

The beginning montage of the guys,
slow motions, jumping off the top rope.

I was enthralled.

It was just the neatest
thing I ever saw.

The best in
professional wrestling.

And I'm Steve.

After the show, I walked out.

You know, my mom
was in the kitchen.

I said, I know what I'm
going to do when I grow up.

And she said once, I said, I'm
going to be a professional wrestler.

I was like, oh,
that's nice, honey.

He began to talk about
that's what he wanted to do.

And I was sure that ultimately
he would grow out of that.

But he never did.

Down at the Freeman Coliseum,
Shawn would periodically get to go.

And oh, he saw Tully Blanchard.

Wahoo McDaniels, Eddie
Mansfield, Scott Casey.

Of course, then later, Ric
Flair was the wrestling god.

And he would buy
wrestling magazines.

And he would look at Ric Flair.

And then he'd stand in the mirror
and try to talk like him and look like him.

Being a wrestling fan, it was really
a black sheep source of mockery.

It's not something you say
with a great deal of pride.

It was just a relationship between
me and wrestling for a while.

And my dad was an amateur
wrestler at the University of Iowa.

So he was a real...
a real wrestler.

And of course, he just gave
some gruff like, ah, that stuff's fake.

The kindest thing I
could say about it was I

considered it to be
an athletic soap opera.

Which was... has always been my
description of professional wrestling.

Then a new kid gets transferred,
but his name is Kenny Kent.

I met Shawn the summer of 1980.

We were sophomores
in high school, both 15.

He would want to wrestle and throw around
his friends, and they didn't like it.

And so I instantly became
his little tag team partner.

And we would just bash each
other and throw each other around.

And that's really what
developed our friendship.

They practiced out in the pool.

Frightening.

Shawn would lift
him straight up.

Kenny would hold him.

And then they'd
fall into the pool.

His way of practicing.

Shawn dreamed of wrestling.

He would call me and tell me these
matches that he would lay out and prepare.

He was really obsessed with it.

In that time... You struggle
back and forth with...

People are telling me it's fake, but I
am there watching the guy... Whap!

I mean, hitting the guy
and sweats flying off.

There's something to it.

They've got me
hook, line, and sinker.

We were a very small school.

We did not have a wrestling team, but
our senior year, we had a talent show.

And it was Shawn's idea that me and
him were going to do a wrestling match.

Everything was going quite well until I
threw Shawn off the stage, into the crowd,

and beat his head on
the table a couple of times.

And there's just blood
gushing all over his head.

And people are going nuts.

I think we came in second.

We didn't win.

We got beat by a
group of cheerleaders.

So, you know, two guys in little
tighty-whities versus cheerleaders.

They're going to win every time.

We graduate.

And then it's, what
are you going to do?

You decided what you want?

I still want to be a wrestler.

I recognize that I
said it when I was 12.

But it's just been a big, big...

part of my life.

Okay, that's awesome.

That's not a possibility.

But, you know, at 17,
you look at them and you

think, you don't know
what you're talking about.

We said, you're
going to college.

There wasn't a lot of hope and
understanding in what I was doing.

We went off to Southwest
Texas State University.

When we lived together in college,
there were many nights I would hear him,

and he's standing there
with his shirt off, and he'd

be talking and screaming
at the mirror, practicing.

At the end of his second
semester, I think his GPA was...

.4.

School just wasn't for him.

And he was ready to make his
move into the wrestling world.

Essentially, he said, I don't want to
waste any more of my time or your money.

I am going to be a
professional wrestler.

My dad played golf with
this guy, and apparently, he's

the guy that's the local
promoter here in San Antonio.

We go down there, and
Jose Lothario was there.

From San Antonio, Texas,
superstar Jose Lothario.

Yeah!

Understood he was
a legitimate name.

The gentleman's saying,
well, he has to be trained.

Jose could do the
training if you wanted.

It's going to cost $3,000.

I thought about facing him when he was
35 or 40 years old, and having him say,

Dad, if you had just given me the chance,
I could have been a professional wrestler.

And I couldn't
face that thought.

And so I said, what the hell?

You know, I wake up every day never,
never forgetting what I did for a living.

Sort of developed a
habit of getting up in the

morning, stretching,
and then the heat pad.

Over the years, you just come up with a
system that your body responds well to.

I do some form of training
every day, you know,

to be comfortable
for the rest of the day.

I plan on getting,
you know, new knees,

knee replacements and
shoulder replacements.

Those things are going
to add to my quality of life.

It's not like I got into
this stuff thinking, I want

to be independently
wealthy and be 100% healthy.

That doesn't happen.

So I don't mind any of it.

I don't think that's
some big, crazy sacrifice.

I first came across
Shawn Michaels in 1983.

Shawn was training with a gentleman
by the name of Jose Lothario.

Jose was a big star in Houston,
Texas, Dallas, San Antonio.

He was Hispanic, so
there was a luchador style.

It was the aerial
side of things.

Thankfully, in all of that
process, he saw that,

oh, my goodness, he's
actually pretty good.

It was worth the $3,000, period, for
him to get me my first job in Louisiana.

That could not have
happened without Jose Lothario.

The pride of Barrow
Beach, Florida, Terry Taylor!

First time I met Shawn Michaels working
for Mid-South, there was this young,

innocent, cheerful, vibrant
sort of lost young man.

I was scared of everything.

It was a lot of confusion,
a lot of unknown.

How in God's name is
this supposed to go on?

They came walking to the back, and Terry
Taylor was standing there at the curtain.

I said, how long you
been in the business?

And he goes, that
was my first match.

I couldn't believe it,
because this isn't easy.

Shawn Michaels.

Very young man, and very inexperienced,
but he has a great deal of natural

athletic ability, We
drove 3,000 miles a week.

That means there's a lot of time
that you're in the car doing this.

And he would ask questions.

Young man who is quite handsome.

I was very well-mannered, I was quiet,
and I wanted to do nothing but work.

Some young people
come in, I know everything.

Nothing like that with Shawn.

Humble, passionate,
driven, hungry.

At about six months,
the owner, Bill Watts,

came to me, and he got
me set up in Kansas City.

I was going to have
the opportunity, to

begin to grow as a
wrestler, as a performer.

We're hearing all this, like, this guy
Shawn Michaels, Shawn Michaels come in,

and we're like, damn, nobody's
got any attention like this.

What's wrong with us?

We walked into the dressing
room, and this guy had real short hair,

green tights, pulled
up to under his chest.

Let me ask this nerd, like, hey, do
you know who Shawn Michaels is?

And anybody goes,
I'm Shawn Michaels.

And I was like, oh, damn.

We got some work to do.

They threw us together, because
they needed a match real quick.

We didn't have
time to prepare for it.

But it clicked.

Marty Jannetty.

Marty just carried himself
with such confidence.

He was enjoying himself.

He was outgoing.

I was so sort of
shy, conservative.

Shawn Michaels.

Shawn came from
a military family.

Shawn was protected from a lot of
the evils that lurk in the real world.

And having some notoriety, being on
television, you've got women, you've got

alcohol, you've got drugs, and
it's all readily available to you.

Yeah, he liked it right away.

At first, he wasn't old enough.

So he had to wait
in the parking lot.

We'd bring girls down to
him and beer down to him.

Marty Jannetty one day said to me,
you know what, I see something in you.

It's just dying to get out.

He said, you just need
somebody to bring it out of you.

And I'm going to bring it out.

From the Showboat Hotel
and Casino in Las Vegas,

Nevada, this is AWA
Championship Wrestling on ESPN.

So I was 20 years old.

TV tapings are in Las Vegas.

At that time, Marty and I, you
know, I knew he was out there.

So you just start
looking around.

All of a sudden, there he is.

He's down there playing
and go down there.

I went and just doop,
doop, doop, pulled it down.

I'm sitting there with him,
and all of a sudden, we

hear this ding, ding,
ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

Red lights go flashing around.

And Shawn hit triple seven.

He wins $1,750.

The first time.

The irony of it now, like, oh, this
place, Vegas and the nightlife of

Vegas and everything
else would be my downfall.

It started later that night.

It's the first line of Yale.

You know, the
first line of blow.

And it's, oh, my gosh, this
is the greatest thing ever.

And just this whole
world opens up.

I'd have never been able
to get that guy out of me.

And Marty is the
guy that helps me.

I tap into that.

I don't even know how
much I knew was there.

Me and Shawn partied Monday night, Tuesday
night, Wednesday night, Thursday night.

Come Friday, we'll burn out.

Big Van Vader, he
comes to hang out with us.

He looked at Curt Hennig, and he goes,
I thought you said these guys partied.

And Curt said, they
don't start until midnight.

The Midnight Rockers, what
a sensational pair they are.

It was like magic.

The Judas Priest song come on.

They love to party.

They have taken the A.W.A.

by storm.

The move happening faster
than we can even talk about it.

They get up on a bigger roof
on the arenas to hold these two.

Sensational to say the least.

Livin' after midnight.

Rockin' till we're gone.

Midnight Rockers had a
hell of a run in the A.W.A.

that had TV on ESPN.

The World Tag Team Championship is
Marty Jannetty and Shawn Michaels' goal.

They were smaller guys.

But they could work with the
Giants and have a great match.

The blood match, if you will, was the
first time that a national audience got

exposed to the talent
of the Midnight Rockers.

This is absolute mayhem.

The match itself was
very bloody, very gory.

One of the toughest, roughest
matches that we have ever seen.

That was kind of like
a defining moment in

their career that they
were made at that level.

If we was on the road 300 days
a year, we partied 290 of them.

We used to do a lot of drugs.

There was a lot
of powder around.

You look at rock stars
and you look at rock bands.

There was a tendency to want
to go wild and destroy things.

It's fun when you're young.

Because you feel like a rebel.

We've made it, man.

Look at this.

Throw a beer bottle
up against the wall, and

it's like, all right,
we'll pay for it later.

We always did the job, but
it was just burning all night.

Destroyed a room with a
showboat, and we got the entire AWA.

The entire company
got kicked out of there.

It wasn't very long that
we had a reputation.

And once you get it,
everybody else knows you got it.

WWE was starting to
really separate itself.

That's where you wanted to go.

That's where you set your goals.

Finally, Marty got the
call to go into New York.

In 1987, the Rockers won.

It started in Buffalo, New York.

Marty and Shawn looked
at this as their big break.

That night in the bar, the
other talent looked at Shawn and

Marty as these two young
punks with a chip on their shoulder.

They're gonna have to earn the
respect of the WWE locker room.

We were scared, man.

We were scared.

So that night, that's why
we kind of kept to ourself.

And Terry Garvin come up
and he said, No, don't do that.

Don't do that.

Y'all have to mingle.

And then all of a sudden,
Jimmy Jack Funk, he came over.

He's hammering
down these drinks.

And he's like, hey,
you guys be partiers.

He starts eating his glass.

Come on, let's do it.

I at least got to
be a little bit tough.

So then I make wine
glass all over my head.

And that was it.

Turn around, I leave.

I would never say we didn't
earn our reputations, any of that.

But the wrestling business
is one giant fish story.

All right, so something
happened once to the

wrestling business that
gets magnified to ten times.

Some people say that Shawn
or Marty threw a beer bottle,

which started a chain of
events that couldn't be stopped.

And then these two guys, I mean,
they're in there just getting crazy,

tearing up the bar, throwing
stuff all over the place.

That is not at all
what happened.

The next day, Shawn
and Marty were fired.

And it was over for them.

After one day.

From just the story and
the hearsay and innuendo.

I normally give reasons as
to why I want to do something.

And I'm sure I did with them,
but that was one and done out.

He said, guys don't like it.

He said, they won't
let you make it here.

In my mind, I'm
23 and it's over.

That was my one big shot.

It happened now and it's gone.

Take a look at Takeover,
we'll watch it, and I'll scull you.

Okay.

Shawn Michaels put his
heart and soul into being

the best pro wrestler
that he could possibly be.

And he does the exact same
thing as a coach and as a producer.

Stop there and
look at each other.

Can that stuff
take a little longer?

He will find ways to pick apart
every little thing to make it better.

Same for the head.

Yeah.

You can't hold back on
that because it's going

to cause you not to
get all the way around.

Shawn has this amazing ability
to instill a confidence in you.

This was tremendous
for the Bronsons.

And when someone like
Shawn Michaels gives that

to you, that's all the
motivation that you need.

The unfortunate byproduct of Shawn and
Marty being fired after their first day in

WWE is, Marty and Shawn had
burned their bridge in the AWA.

Where do you go?

Welcome once again to
Continental Championship Wrestling.

We ended up in
Birmingham, Alabama.

Continental Wrestling.

I was wrestling in front of 25
people at 300 bucks a week.

If you wanted to get $50 in cash, get
your other $50 and below, you could do

that, which is probably what
I did nine times out of ten.

I heard him talk about
how depressed he was.

At that time, we was
doing a lot of cocaine.

And we would talk about wrestling,
and we would watch wrestling videos,

and we would study.

I had to go home to my girlfriend
like at 2 or 3 or 4 in the morning.

Sometimes the next
morning, the sun was out.

And evidently, the
way he says it, I let him

down because I didn't
stay with him more.

And he was by himself.

When you're doing cocaine,
you don't want to be alone.

When you're up at 4 o'clock in the morning
coming down from the Yale, that's like...

it's very dreary.

Because the low
is just so really low.

I was like, man, if I had a gun,
this is one of those times that I was

reckless enough to
have the balls to do it.

At that time, it would
have wrecked my parents.

You know, their suffering is
what pulled me back from that.

But the thing is, I
never told them the truth.

So I'm not telling like,
geez, mom, I'm just

partying and getting
hammered and doing blow.

Sean and Marty, they
wanted to come back.

I remember Pat Patterson giving them the
advice to continue to work and continue to

reverse the reputation that you
have and prove to us that you belong.

And that's what
Marty and Sean did.

Pat was instrumental in
saying, Vince, he's a great talent.

And it was difficult for me to make
that decision because he was a jerk.

He was doing some stupid things.

But Pat was right.

I was there in 88
when they came back.

It had been a year since
the Rockers had come back.

They were kind of
screwed up on their first day.

We're going to bring you
back, but you're on probation.

You know, keep
your s*** together.

Yes, sir.

These guys are
excitement personified.

They'll be high flying.

I met Sean in 1990.

They were pretty much,
you know, fun loving guys.

They even tested me a little bit
with their, you know, their antics.

Actually, you know, they were
both pretty much peckerheads.

I mean, I got to call
a spade a spade.

The Rockers got a bag full of
tricks and you ain't seen nothing yet.

So get ready because
here we come.

They were definitely innovators
doing tandem moves together.

You know, such a cohesive unit.

The fans were nuts for them.

Especially the women.

You know, the
long hair and all that.

There was a transitional moment happening
in the business where the athleticism was

picking up the ability to do things
that Sean and Marty could do.

Oh, what a backdrop!

Tag team wrestling now has been impacted
a great deal by what Marty and I did.

First time you ever
make a magazine is huge.

And we would always go through the stores,
stop and look at the magazine racks.

I remember one
time I heard Sean.

Oh my God!

And it was a picture of us.

It said, from imitators
to innovators.

And he's holding it up
and he was so proud.

And I was like,
oh man, we did it.

Shawn Michaels!

Bernie Jannetty!

The Rocker!

That's a real notch in the belt to
be on Saturday Night's Main Event.

Saturday Night's Main Event was finally
going to be the Rockers winning the Tag

Team Championship against Bret
Hart and Jim the Animal Neidhart.

It was going to be five stars.

It was going to be as good
a match as we ever had.

We're in the process of having that
match and all of a sudden, the rope breaks.

Bret, the consummate pro, he
understands it's not live, it's taped.

We can fix all this.

It's taped.

All you got to do is grab a
hold and then they'll fix it.

And then you're still in that
hold and the match can carry on.

And I told him, I
said, just fix the rope.

Fix the rope.

Fix the rope.

We'll take care of this.

And then we get word
just to continue without it.

So, that's what we do.

It was a disaster and
I was so sick about it.

We get our championship victory.

We are doing our best
to look excited in what

is this huge, steaming
pile of crap in the ring.

It just looked horrible.

So, the match never aired.

Vince calls me and said, we're not
going to acknowledge that you won.

We're going to
give the belts back.

I go, okay.

Are we going to have
another opportunity to do that?

No, we're probably just
going to go another direction.

Unbelievably disappointed because that's
not what you imagine that moment being.

Done.

It's over.

We were on the road
300 days a year for years.

Same hotel, same rent-a-car.

Some of the same girls.

I remember we were in Denver.

Roddy Piper came into the
room and we had a few girls there.

And Roddy kept
bragging on Shawn.

He was stirring up the
pot as far as saying, you

know, I could be a singles
and have great success.

And things like that.

And he'd look at me and go,
well, you got to work on you.

You're still rough
around the edges.

I was like, Roddy, shouldn't we
talk about that some other time?

And Shawn shoved
me at that point.

Everybody got in a fight
because everybody was

not in their, you know,
best frame of mind.

Like all the time.

And he tackled
me in the hallway.

And then I didn't want to hit him
once, let alone, you know, over and over.

I had blood like, it looked like, you
know, gutted a deer or something.

You have a speculation that Molly Jannetty
and Shawn Michaels are not getting along.

You have a speculation that Shawn Michaels
is kind of wanting to go on his own.

All of my success at
that point was tag teams.

But there was never a time
in my career where someone

didn't say to me, like, I
think you've got some talent.

It was eventually going
to come down to me.

I remember when the first time he told me,
I want to be the world champion one day.

I don't want to tag
the rest of our career.

I just need you to let me know.

When you're ready for
that, don't spring it on me.

And then he sprung
it on me anyway.

Welcome to the barbershop,
ladies and gentlemen.

Let's welcome them right now.

They're the Rockers.

Recently there's been a lot of
controversy, a lot of rumors flying, guys.

Maybe you guys
are going to break up.

You've been having
some problems.

I didn't become familiar
with Shawn until he

showed up in WWE with
Marty Jannetty as the Rocker.

That's my first introduction
to Shawn Michaels.

See, one without the other.

I just knew he was
going to do that.

I would argue the barbershop window is
the greatest tag team breakup of all time.

It is the standard bearer
for turning on a friend.

It's super good.

Oh, he laid again.

Oh, he got me back for Denver.

Is there a problem?

Oh, my God.

It was so effective that it makes Shawn
one of the most hated men in wrestling.

Shawn Michaels changed
forever on that day.

I had this strange thing
with Marty because without

him, so much of the good
doesn't happen for me.

But there's a ceiling on
being a tag team, period.

Whether it's called a
leading man as opposed to

a leading duo, it's
just a natural evolution.

Now everybody is going to find out
what Shawn Michaels has known all along,

that he is without a doubt
the hottest thing the World

Wrestling Federation
has ever, ever laid eyes on.

The Heartbreak Kid Shawn
Michaels was something

that Shawn just pretty
much came up with.

I don't think that anybody really
mapped out the Heartbreak Kid.

It's sort of an Elvis
meets Freddie Mercury.

Shawn Michaels is
leaving the building.

It was allowing me a vehicle
to let this other person out.

To get out there in
front of a bunch of people

and you can just be
somebody you've never been.

Has this guy got it all or what?

No, I don't know where
all that came from.

I really don't.

He figured Shawn Michaels
could do whatever he wanted to.

What, an alter ego?

Maybe.

The Kentucky Waterfall
mullet alone, probably

one of the greatest
mullets of all time.

He is arrogant.

He's talking.

The dangling earrings,
the Village People outfit.

Your girlfriend wants him.

You're gonna go
up and kick his ass.

But maybe he's gonna kick
yours and take her anyway.

And that's where his heat was.

I was a pretty kid.

I was a pretty man.

I don't mind telling
you at one time.

Could play the part of
Mr. Confident and everything

else and could do
everything under the sun.

Couldn't do a lick.

Elvis and Freddie
Mercury were on stage.

They were so...

frickin' positive.

But in their lives,
they struggled.

There was something there between me and
those individuals that I could relate to.

You're not comfortable
with who you are.

You're not comfortable
with yourself.

Not knowing who I
was as a human being.

Out there, you're
playing this role, but you

can do it with just
unbridled confidence.

And you absolutely cannot do it
by yourself in your own hotel room.

I am a high-performance,
state-of-the-art wrestling machine.

I think any great
character will be confused

between the human
being and the character.

And Shawn Higginbottom kind of morphed
into the Heartbreak Kid at all times.

Shawn was becoming
a little bit more difficult.

And the Intercontinental title
is coming to the sexiest man!

The WWE was still the land of the giants,
and there were still a lot of big guys.

And Shawn wanted to break through
what he considered a glass ceiling of,

I'm not 6'8", I'm not 300 pounds, I want
to be what I am, and I want to be the guy.

When you are that talented, and that
hell-bent on succeeding, to have the chip

on your shoulder of being the little
guy, to get to where he needs to be,

to stand his ground, he had
to fight for what he wanted.

I was at the very least
as good or better than, you

know, anybody else that I
was sharing a locker room with.

I was getting an opportunity that not
many guys like me were gonna get.

We gotta do it,
Intercontinental Champion!

Shawn may have been 6'1", but his eagle
and the chip on his shoulder made him 9'5".

Shawn Michaels, he's our
Intercontinental Champion!

By 92, 93, Intercontinental Champion
at the time, we're looking for Shawn to

really step up and
become a huge star for us.

One thing I did have is I
wasn't scared of anything.

I was the most dangerous person in
the world because I had nothing to lose.

And when you are like that in a creative
line of work, you are freaking unbeatable.

In the process of studying
Shawn Michaels' matches, the one

that many people go back to
is the infamous ladder match.

The match that Shawn Michaels and Razor
Ramon made famous at WrestleMania 10.

We are making history here!

So right before WrestleMania 10 leading
up, there was a suspension with Shawn

where Shawn had been out
of the company for a while.

Shawn left as the
Intercontinental Champion.

Yeah, he failed a
drug test for roids.

At that time, brother, pills were
being passed around in bars.

Like, guys go, here man,
Canadian Vibe, here, take this.

Shawn did not feel that he should
have been suspended, was pissed off.

Vince didn't want to put up with him,
thought he was an out of control egomaniac.

And they tell Shawn to send the belt back
and he says, no, I'm not sending it back.

Shawn decides he
wants to come back.

Well, Razor is
Intercontinental Champion.

So take both championship
belts, hang them above the ring.

You fight to climb the ladder.

Whoever gets championships above
the ring, that's your true champion.

The two Intercontinental
Championship belts hanging from above.

For the following
contest, there are no rules.

It's the most barbaric, insane car
crash excitement you've ever seen.

I was able to have a presence
that I don't think they knew that I had.

It isn't about size,
it is about presence.

Shawn actually lost the match.

But it put Shawn at a
different level that people

believed this little
bastard could do anything.

If you didn't before, or you didn't want
to believe, Shawn made you believe.

She closed it, just
dropped it to the side.

Boom, and then she said, okay,
mister, here we go, whatever.

I don't know, just
throwing it out there.

This weekend we have
one of our bigger events.

Five-man ladder match.

Someone will be
holding that right there.

Many, many years ago, it was
just two of us and one ladder.

And now these young men and women
have taken it to a whole other level.

You got a lot of moving parts.

I always dreamed of
being in a ladder match,

obviously, because
of Shawn and Razor.

Ladder matches are about crazy stunts,
big falls, the car crash come to life.

He is the face of
the ladder match.

And to have him kind
of help us out, have him

kind of watch over us,
you can't dream it up.

It's perfect.

I met him in the
locker room in 1993.

And wanted to know if I would be
interested in becoming his partner.

Shawn is a bodyguard.

And the first thing out of Shawn's mouth
is, just so you know, everybody hates us.

The bodyguard position was 24-7.

It wasn't just on
television persona.

He had a lot of people
that didn't like him.

Shawn Michaels was misunderstood
all throughout his career.

There was a certain
perception that he was a, frankly.

Shawn was selfish.

Shawn did have an
out-of-control ego.

And Shawn did feel he was
better than everybody else.

He was successful.

And to take it to the next level, you
have to start looking out for yourself.

It's not a team sport.

The one thing that was the saving grace
for Shawn was, he was so good in the ring.

As a performer, if you work with a
guy that makes you look that good,

I don't care what you think of
him, you want to work with him.

Shawn Michaels, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall,
123kid, and then Paul Levesque, Triple H.

These were guys that
loved hanging out together.

And hence, the
clique began to form.

We all just hit it off, man.

It was, you know, all we did was
talk nonstop about the business.

And, you know, we were
all just so passionate about it.

The perception was that the clique
was all-knowing and all-powerful.

And that if you crossed
the clique, they'll

just go to events and
you'll be blackballed.

They couldn't call
any of the shots.

But I listened.

And they had some
really good ideas.

Really smart, individually.

And Shawn was very
smart when he sold around.

Shawn had an attitude when he
drank, even more so, on top of pills.

And Shawn would say, you know,
the wrong thing at the wrong time.

And he was protected
in the WB environment.

You know, but outside
of the environment.

Shawn Michaels, British
Bulldog, 123kid, walk into a bar.

Me, Scott, and
Kev were in Europe.

It was where we find
out that this all happened.

A bunch of Marines
in a tough bar.

Every eye in that place
turns to the three wrestlers that

just walked in the door, of
which Shawn is the megastar.

Every girl in that place
starts to look at Shawn.

Shawn is very
enamored with that.

And Shawn is at this point in his
life like, what the are you looking at?

A problem jarhead?

They go to walk out.

Six Marines walk
out, beat the out of

Shawn, and leave him
in the side of the car.

And the last thing I can remember is,
you know, there being the coat check.

The next thing is
waking up in the hospital.

And everything else
is a complete blank.

That was four days
out of a seven day week.

Situations like that.

Getting beat up by nine guys in Syracuse,
to me, there's not a whole lot of shame in.

You know, that kind of stuff
just sort of happens to me.

I've got two choices.

Sit home and cry, or to
come out and be a pain.

I got news for you folks.

I'm all cried out.

His moment of existence was the
20 minutes in the ring every night.

He wouldn't be messed up.

He'd go in there and
he'd kill it every night.

And then the second
he was done, I'm in pain.

And I took some stuff, so I
wouldn't be in pain this morning.

But I'm not messed up.

Why would you hang
out with this misery 24-7?

No, it's not.

It's, again, like your brother.

It's like a family member.

Shawn owes his life to Triple H.

Paul Levesque
owes his life to him.

Shawn Michaels knows
that the greatest match

of his life must come
this Sunday night.

By the time you get to the mid-90s,
Bret Hart has become a crowd favorite.

Bret is a very soft-spoken,
quiet Canadian gentleman.

Shawn is an outspoken,
loud, brash American.

Only one person can be
the absolute alpha dog.

The Iron Man match, the
boyhood dream realized.

It added another layer to
the Shawn Michaels character.

The Iron Man match is
the opportunity where I get

to, you know, get my
first world championship.

There's only one!

Heartbreak kick!

Unbelievable!

What a ride!

An hour-long match.

It's going to be a long night
at the office in wrestling terms.

For the World Wrestling
Federation Championship!

We started to have our issues.

You know, I was never
big on the click idea.

It was a testy match
in a lot of ways.

There's a famous part where
I jump off the second rope.

That's it!

He comes up and kicks me
in the face as hard as he could.

I mean, he almost
knocked me out.

Oh my goodness!

We stiffed each other a
lot of times in that match.

Wait a minute!

He got it!

He got it!

The boyhood dream!

Boyhood dreams come true because
that was Shawn's boyhood dream.

It was.

And that's exactly
what happened.

It was a very big
moment for my career.

It's like, oh, it's your
first world championship.

And you go like, oh.

I picture it being different.

I wasn't at a good
place and all that.

All that kind of stuff.

There's a lot of responsibility
that goes with that.

Now every guy in that locker
room, their well-being, their life, their

livelihood and all that,
depends on the job that you do.

You know, it all falls
on your shoulders.

The whole thing
was uncomfortable.

As we got into 1996, Ted Turner,
who owned WCW, our competitors,

was being very aggressive
in his quest for new talent.

Scott Hall and Kevin Nash, they were
going to leave and go to Ted Turner's WCW.

The last matches being in New
York in Madison Square Garden.

On May 19th, 1996, one of the greatest
days of wrestling and my life as well.

Me and my friend went to a house
show, which was not televised.

We would sneak in a camera past
security and we would film the shows.

Shawn was my hero back then.

He was my idol growing up.

The ending shows Shawn
Michaels giving Diesel a super kick.

Match is over.

And then, all of a sudden,
Razor Moon comes out.

I'm like, oh, cool.

They start hugging and
I'm screaming like a little girl.

It was this and it turns out to
be Hunter Hearst Hounsley.

They all start hugging and, you
know, obviously saying goodbye.

It was insane.

That night was magical.

The business was well protected.

Up until then.

And our camera still kept going.

The only camera that was there.

If we were not involved
in taping the current

call, it would not be
talked about as much today.

Place is going insane.

Everybody knows everything
on the inside of the business.

There's no secrets.

People in the business,
they didn't like it.

They thought it was the
worst thing that happened.

Here's this bad guy who we have no
idea is friends with all these other guys.

It's breaking the fourth wall and just
telling people everything you do is wrong.

The only thing we just
did is **** Shawn Michaels.

He's now hugging and
kissing the guy that he

just spent 20 minutes
beating the hell out of.

We entertained you,
but now it's all over.

We're really good buddies.

Taboo in the wrestling business.

The tape was
leaked out to a writer.

The tape blows up on its own.

I had no idea it was
going to happen.

It was something that's
never been done before.

I'm watching this and going,
what the hell is going on?

The click was an
insult to our business.

They had done that
in the 70s, early 80s.

They had all four fingers
**** beat out of them.

They wrestled each other and
they all kissed and said goodbye.

Somebody's got
to go down for it.

Kev's gone.

Scott's gone.

Shawn's the champ.

Stuff rolls downhill.

And, yeah, it all rolled on me.

Triple H is the one that probably
paid the heaviest price as

far as his career kind of
hitting a roadblock at that point.

Shawn didn't really pay a price.

I was inherently
selfish regardless.

So I'm sure I didn't feel the, you
know, the compassion for him as I,

maybe as I should have.

There was a bit of a
shutdown on Shawn.

Business is, it's
okay, but it's not great.

You know, there's a lot of banter
about Shawn's not working as champion.

He's not drawing.

He's collapsing
under the pressure.

I can see him falling apart.

Kevin and Scott are gone.

And I'm all he's got now.

He's a mess.

I felt a lot of pressure
and I didn't handle it well.

For me, it was, it was all
about running and escaping.

And honestly, you know, it was running
and escaping from the dude I'd become.

Better than having to face that.

How about I just take a few
of these and knock myself out.

I wouldn't pay attention
to it till tomorrow.

He'd be pilled up, passed out.

Put Shawn on a luggage cart.

Roll him up to his room.

Get him undressed.

Dig dip out of his mouth
and put him on his side.

Put a pillow behind him.

So he wouldn't roll over and
choke to death in his sleep.

And set an alarm and get up every
two, three hours to go check on him.

And that was every night.

You know, every night.

Sad existence.

What everybody has to understand
about Shawn Michaels is this.

I want to come out here and look
like a blithering idiot on live TV.

Believe me, I'm gonna do it.

Why?

Because I can.

Yeah!

He had a drug
problem for a while.

A serious one.

And he kind of fell in
the hole even deeper.

But it wasn't until he
became champion that I

felt that Shawn started
to question himself.

I called his dad, the colonel,
and said, I'd like to visit.

So I flew down to meet him.

And I'm saying, you're
probably not aware of this.

Shawn really has a drug problem.

The colonel got angry.

He just didn't want to hear it.

I don't know that anybody
knew how to address it.

Even things like rehab.

My parents, you
know, God love them.

I don't know that they knew
what it was that you did.

Except just to be worried.

Not long after that,
I tweaked my knee.

Michaels up, out, and down.

I went to this doctor in San Antonio
who doesn't know anything about wrestling.

And obviously, he
sees I've tore my ACL.

He's like, dude, you're dumb.

You're not wrestling
with a torn ACL.

I know that over the last several
months, I've lost a lot of things.

And one of them
has been my smile.

He went in the ring to announce he
was retiring because he had a bad knee.

I didn't believe his
knee was the issue.

I always thought the
issue was he didn't want to

wrestle me at WrestleMania
13 and drop the belt to me.

I doubted Shawn's integrity
as far as his injury went.

You phony little faker.

Why don't you take your
little pussyfoot injury?

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

It's all right.

No.

No.

I'm not going anywhere.

Go back and find your smile.

I got accused of faking it.

Bret told everybody
I was faking it.

My excuse is, drug
addicts lie all the time.

Well, there's no doubt that you
found your smile again as you stated...

A year off of the wrestling
business was a year no pay.

That's just not... that
isn't feasible, and he said,

well, look, you can put a
brace on it and wrap it up.

They went and they got me
a brace and everything else.

I was like, okay, I can do this.

But it's time for
the Heartbreak Kid.

This was a moment where
things needed to change.

Business was bad.

WCW was starting to kill us.

Put Shawn and I together on TV.

We will multiply each other's
personalities on screen.

Put us together.

DX is born.

Degeneration X consisted of
Shawn, Triple H, and Chyna.

Two goofs in Shawn and
Hunter that were immature

and did everything that
you weren't supposed to do.

Shawn Michaels, you're a
disgrace to professional wrestling.

I saw it as inmates had
taken over the asylum.

I'm gonna start with that degenerate
right beside you in the green shirt.

Degeneration X!

Suck it!

Yeah, I can't say I liked it.

The smut and the crotch shots.

It did get pretty raunchy.

I liked it.

I don't think it
was over the line.

You know, we were getting
our tails kicked in the ratings.

DX took it to the very, very
tipping point of going too far.

But that's what we needed.

It was kind of a whole
facelift for the company.

They loved it.

Raiders are going up.

Your segments are hot.

We are Degeneration X!

You make your rules
and we will break them!

They were the anti-authority.

They could do
anything they wanted.

We were just trying to
make each other laugh.

Say something so
stupid that people would

go, oh my God, I can't
believe he said that.

Your old lady is not too
thrilled with your privates.

You would think, like, okay, so
everything's great backstage with Sean.

No.

We're still approaching
this from a place of anger.

We know we're pissing people
off and we're trying to be dicks.

I got in trouble
for a lot of stuff.

That we all thought was funny and
clearly we might have been the only ones.

I'm going out in
a blaze of glory!

At that point, Sean's DX personality and
his real personality have kind of morphed.

So Sean really
never turned it off.

This is what it's come down to.

You're looking at somebody
that's got no respect for anything.

There was a true animosity
between Brett and Sean.

It just spiraled
completely out of control.

In the beginning, Sean
and Brett were friends.

And the antagonistic, the antagonistic
relationship that they had on camera,

that was all orchestrated.

But it became personal.

It became personal
between Brett and Sean.

Because one guy
would go too far.

I never knew enough to
avoid the confrontation.

If something bothered
Brett, I made sure that I did it.

He stabbed the World
Wrestling Federation in the back.

Why?

For his financial gain.

Instead of facing me like a man, you're
too busy posing for girly magazines.

You know, I know you don't
like me talking about you

posing for Playgirl, but
you did pose for Playgirl.

And we finally had a
fisticuff in the dressing room.

Oh, my God.

Brett and Sean just
get into a fight and pull

each other's hair out
of the locker room.

I'm like, what?

And run over
there and find Sean.

He had a big chunk of
hair missing on the side.

He's like, what are you doing?

I realize that I hate your guts.

We had a lot of
these resets and talks.

And we would always end up offending
each other quickly right after that.

Brett is the champion.

But Brett's on his way to WCW.

And he doesn't want
to drop the title to Sean.

But they couldn't let
Brett leave with the

title and then show up
on WCW TV the next night.

Who's gonna win?

I don't know.

Brett thought the match
was going to go one way.

Sean and Vince McMahon
come up with a different plan.

Brett doesn't know
about the plan.

We're being told by Vince,
like, this goes nowhere.

This goes to your grave.

This is high-level
espionage, man.

Nobody ever knows this.

It's kind of what's
best for business.

Look out!

Sean Blackwell is not
gonna waste any time.

The whole thing
was uncomfortable.

I was out there, you know,
whatever being Judas.

They had created a spot where Sean
was gonna put Brett's move, which is a

submission hold, the
sharpshooter, on Brett.

Look at this!

Oh, you're kidding me.

It's definitely one of the most
fabled stories in our industry.

The Montreal Screwdrop.

Just minutes into that
match, not one person on

planet Earth thinks the
match is going to end.

Are you kidding me?

So when all of a sudden
the bell rings, there's

complete confusion as to
why the match has ended.

What happened?

Brett Hart gave up
on the sharpshooter!

He said Brett submitted,
which didn't happen.

Wow, you talk about controversy.

It was basically a hit to make
sure that they got the title off of Brett.

I could see Vince yell
at him to ring the bell.

Like, they're trying
to screw me now.

Michael with a sharpshooter!

That's the cut!

The WWF champion!

And Brett Hart is
standing in disbelief!

Amazing!

I didn't know Vince
was coming out.

I think he just felt like maybe if he was
out there, he might get some heat off me.

You know, thus making
my denial plausible.

Shawn, you were in on that?

I get to know him, please.

God's my witness.

My hands are clean this
much, I swear to God.

Vince says, I want to
take the heat for this.

I don't want anyone to think
you had anything to do with it.

He's got it.

Okay, let's get out of here.

I took the heat.

I didn't want anyone to know
that Shawn was involved.

And then Brett comes over
and knocked the out of me.

One punch and
knocked him out cold.

He went straight down
on his back, out cold.

And after I knocked Vince
out, Shawn was crying.

Shawn sat on the
bench and was crying.

Even though I didn't feel like I did
anything wrong that night, you're still

carrying a burden by not
coming clean with that.

You just say, yes, I knew.

Vince asked Shawn to do something
for everyone in this company.

Who else would have
had the balls, the guts, right

or wrong, how many other
people would have done it?

I remember going to
his house in San Antonio.

And I'm driving my
minivan down there.

I've got my wife and
three kids at home.

And I pull into his
gorgeous home.

I don't have 20
bucks in my pocket.

And I'll never forget, he
put his arms out like this.

And he just looked up at me.

And he goes, you
could have had all this.

But I realized somewhere along
the way that I saw him lose so much.

He got into drugs.

And there was some really
bad side effects to his fame.

I looked at Kenny a lot
of times and having a wife

and a family and just
been as happy as can be.

And I've always looked at and admired
and thought it was pretty enviable to have.

But with my line of work, it was
always wondering, can you have both?

Or is that not possible?

They don't mix.

The following contest
is a casket match for

the World Wrestling
Federation Championship.

This casket match is
the Undertaker's specialty.

The object of a casket match is to beat
your opponent down far enough that you can

throw them into the casket
or coffin and shut the lid.

And if you do that,
you win the match.

He's going to be in the ring.

Somewhere through the course of that
match, I threw him over this giant coffin.

I wanted to clear it
and go to the floor.

And I just didn't
quite get far enough.

And bam, I just
hit their corner.

But I didn't really
think much about it.

You know, you
still finish the match.

Look at this!

The next day, I just
remember getting up like, ah,

you know, waking up and
not being able to move.

First time I recall
being in that much pain.

We do all the x-rays.

Apparently, I blew the disc.

And that's the kind of
stuff that needs to be fused.

The doctor says, you
can't be wrestling after that.

He said, I'm never
going to wrestle again.

Yadda, yadda, yadda.

And I said, nobody
tells me what to do.

So we're going to WrestleMania.

With Steve.

So you give me
enough drugs, all right?

Let's do whatever we can
to get me to WrestleMania.

Getting Shawn to
WrestleMania was a battle.

He had a bad back.

He was heavily medicated.

He is the World Wrestling
Federation champion, the

man who will defend his
title against Stone Cold.

But Mike Tyson is the enforcer
here, ladies and gentlemen.

Shawn Michaels.

I choose to make
an ass out of a...

toughest SOB.

I can do that any time I want.

I was going to have to talk myself
up and drop the belt to Steve.

And then I guess I'll
let my career be over.

He was bitter.

It had nothing to
do with him losing.

It had to do with
being replaced.

He never had his moment.

He never had his run.

I'm still the greatest.

Now it's his run.

What do I do?

I'm the backup guy.

One of the most messed up things
I ever heard Shawn say in his life is,

I should have taken so many
pills I died after WrestleMania 10.

I'd have been the
biggest star of all time.

I'd have been Elvis.

It's hopelessness.

And certainly
that's where I was.

I am not just, you
know, a drug addict.

I'm an angry one.

And I mean angrier than ever.

At that time in my
life, that's all I had.

I identified who I was with
what I was doing in that ring.

And without it, I wouldn't have
known what to do with my life.

On the day of WrestleMania
14, we barely talked.

You know, he didn't feel
like doing business with me.

Triple H was the conduit
between most of it.

He was pissed.

He wasn't about to talk
to Steve about this match.

I helped him put it together
by going from room to room.

And it was just, it
was so difficult to do.

It was difficult.

I remember that day.

I'm thinking, I don't know
what Shawn's going to do.

If he's retiring, you know, this
could be his final screw you.

Nobody has ever, ever outperformed
Shawn Michaels in a big match situation.

I'm not in great shape.

My back was pretty bad
being in that much pain.

Got the cortisone
shots and stuff like that.

Yeah!

Oh, God!

What velocity!

I feel like I'm
putting him over.

That's good enough.

Awesome!

He got it!

Let's dance!

Shawn's always a troublemaker.

He always wants
to get in your face.

Talk.

Even when he's on
your team, he just talks.

He's an irritant.

That's what he is.

Shawn had sour grapes.

That was kind of a close
blow, because Shawn

was pretty much
out for a little while.

Tyson takes the Austin 316 shirt
and lays it across Shawn's chest.

This was adding insult to injury,
and this was rubbing salt in a wound.

I would have been pissed, too.

Not exactly the screw job.

But it was them
getting the last laugh, as

far as, you know,
you no good little prick.

You put us through
hell this week, but we're

at least going to get
you going out the door.

The new World Wrestling Federation
champion, Stone Cold Steve Austin.

He was going to that press conference
to just let everybody know, I'm pissed off.

He walked in the door
and he yelled some stuff.

Oh, yeah, it's up.

It's selfish and it's stupid.

But, you know, that's
where he was at that time.

Shawn is suffering from
ruptured disc as we speak

and will not participate
at this press conference.

Nonetheless, he participated in
the arena in an extraordinary way.

And there is no
athlete in the world that

can say they can do what
Shawn Michaels does.

I got on the plane the next morning
and went home and began to, I don't know,

let it all sort of sink in.

It takes some time before it goes
from being time off to the reality of how

exactly is the rest of your life
going to go when you're done at 33.

Okay, see if I can
get one done here.

All they knew at the time was
stuff like that you don't recover from.

People don't get back in
the ring and wrestle again.

The thing is, I can't keep
coming out here week after

week after week going
back and forth with all this.

I've got to get
busy with my rehab.

My physical therapy.

My physical therapy for my back.

Now I've got a legitimate
reason to have pain pills.

And I've got a prescription
and everything else.

I just want to be
a pro wrestler.

That's what I was
trying to go back to.

So I began to start the Shawn
Michaels Wrestling Academy.

We had a couple rings.

I had a little workout room.

There were a couple
guys that came through

my school that went on
to have WWE success.

It was a great experience.

It really was.

I did it for about two
and a half, three years.

So I'm at home
and I'm watching TV.

Then all of a sudden it's the
introduction of this new Nitro girl.

The Tampa Bay
girl herself, Whisper.

And she's out there with
this chair just doing this dance.

And it's captivating.

And she's absolutely the most
beautiful thing I've ever seen.

We were at a rehearsal.

And one of the Nitro girls, Spice, had
mentioned to me that a man named Shawn

Michaels, a former
wrestler, wanted to meet me.

And that was the first
time I'd ever heard of him.

I called her up.

We probably talked for three hours
on the phone each night for two weeks.

Two weeks of
talking and emailing.

And then I flew out to
San Antonio to see him.

And we dated for
about two weeks.

After that, he told
me he loved me.

I told him I loved him.

Two weeks after
that, we got married.

It was the Graceland wedding.

The wedding chapel.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, and Elvis impersonated
her walking down the aisle.

Regrets.

It was fantastic.

It's just the
greatest thing ever.

There was one evening
where my pills have kicked in.

And I'm out of it.

Shawn was in tremendous pain.

When he would take the muscle relaxers,
he would usually pass out over his food.

The very first time that Shawn ever
did that was when we were first married.

So it was a bit
of a shock to me.

So I got him in the shower because
he had spilled food all over his chest.

And I would say it probably
happened a couple times a week.

The worst time, again, was when
she was eight months pregnant.

She's doing everything she can at eight
months pregnant with her belly trying to

hold me up.

I took pity on him.

And I just prayed for
him is all I could do.

But it didn't make me think, you know,
what in the world have I gotten into?

If I was fearful, I was
fearful for our unborn child.

And I hoped that it would end
whenever the baby was born.

And it didn't.

I don't remember
why Shawn was there.

There must have been somebody
doing something in the show.

We all go, me, Taker, Rock.

Vince is in the ring.

I own WCW.

Shawn is messed up.

Pilled up.

So this is... a
celebratory moment.

He's belligerent.

Loud.

Falling down.

Staggering.

Vince calls him in.

Tells him, go home.

Done with you.

Shawn goes ballistic.

Walks by me in the hallway.

Just goes off.

You know, I went and...

browbeat Hunter.

Unfairly.

Obviously.

And I just...

went off back.

You know, just in his face.

Screaming match back and forth.

And he storms out.

And that's another
one that makes me cry.

I went and said some mean
stuff to him and walked out.

And, uh...

you know...

that sucks as well.

And I don't talk to him...

for...

a long time.

We didn't...

speak...

I don't know.

I mean, I would think at
least a year, two years.

That was... what
do they call it?

The rock bottom.

So...

that's a completely
different story.

But, I mean, I am not afraid.

a very, very unique story.

I don't want to say that...

But we were there.

But we had that.

And... I always think that...

that we were trying to
make him feel... comfortable.

And he was able...

to...

be comfortable.

I went into the bathroom and closed the
door, looking at yourself in the mirror,

and, you know, I sat there and cried like
a baby and wept, you know, realizing that

you are failing a, you know,
a two-year-old little boy.

And all of those things sort of came
crashing down that night, and I just,

it's the first time I ever fail
like such a frickin' failure.

I think that that was
the last straw for him.

And when he woke up the next morning,
he told me that he was never taking pills

or drinking again, and
from that point, he didn't.

It was an instantaneous letting
go of the drugs and alcohol.

I just called him up
out of the clear blue.

I just asked him when
was the last time he talked

to Paul, and he just
avoided that situation.

I just said, man, you're
wrong, you gotta call him.

I called Hunter and let him know, you
know, how sorry I was and how I felt.

You know, how out of line I was.

But I said, I hope
you can forgive me.

I needed that from Hunter.

For me, it was easy.

Like, I didn't...

As long as he wasn't
drugs talking to me.

That's good.

Of course I do regret the pain
that it caused people in my life.

There is a part of that that I don't think
that Michael Shaw and Hickenbottom can get

to where he got creatively
without a little bit of that reckless...

risky mindset.

I wouldn't have
had the guts to do it.

It was our first Christmas
together, and I gave Shawn a

Bible and some other books,
and he began reading them.

I had never had
anything that I could grasp

that was bigger than
the wrestling business.

That's just not enough to
base, I don't know, a life on.

I worked at Cornerstone
Church in San Antonio, Texas.

All of a sudden, I heard a deep voice
that, I want to come to a Bible study.

And then I got up from
my desk and stuck my head

out the door and I said,
well, you can come to mine.

When he left, everybody came out to
him and said, do you know who that was?

I said, no, I don't
know who that was.

Who was it?

And he said, Shawn Michaels.

I said, well, who's
Shawn Michaels?

He said, well, first, Keith, I
want you to pray for my back.

He said, I've been out of
wrestling and I want to go back.

I said, well, it's a simple
prayer that we can pray together.

And while he was saying that
prayer, tears just come out of his eyes.

I got nobody to blame but me.

And I don't have anything in
common with the other dude.

And I don't know
how it got that way.

It wasn't from family.

It wasn't from upbringing.

He was so desperate to get back in a close
relationship with Rebecca and his son.

I was now a dad.

I was a husband.

And I was really devoted
and thrilled about that.

You're like a child.

You just want to tell
everybody, I've been saved.

Once Shawn got his life together
and found Christ, it was night and day.

When he looks back at his life,
that's the biggest thing that he ever did.

You were dealing with a grown
up when Shawn came back.

Someone who was
there to do business.

Shawn was a lot calmer
and much easier to deal with.

Shawn Michaels of old is very different
from Shawn Hickenbottom, the man I married.

The sexy boy and
all that kind of stuff.

And his cocky attitude
and that kind of stuff.

And that cocky little
smile that he does.

That's so far from
who he really is.

I remember somebody
asking me, they said,

you know, hey, I heard
Shawn found religion.

Yeah.

They laughed.

And I said, well, I don't know
anybody that died OD'ing on religion.

He had called Triple H.

He thanked Hunter for the
time on the road because before

his marriage to me, the one
that took care of him was Hunter.

That night after Shawn
had gone to bed, he woke up

in the morning and the
pain was gone in his back.

It was definitely a miracle.

So he was physically
ready to go back in the ring.

And I knew that the Lord
would take care of him.

We were kind of having
a conversation at the time.

And then he said, he was like, I want
my son to see me do this one time.

He said, I don't
know that I can do it.

I don't know
physically if I can or not.

And he said, if I'm going
to, I only trust one person.

It's you.

If you consider it, I
would love to do it.

What do you think?

Almost away from the non-sanctioned
fight between two men who

are at one time best friends,
Shawn Michaels and Triple H.

Shawn Michaels last wrestled
1,609 days ago, if you can believe that.

His whole family was there.

They were all scared to death.

Found a ring, did
a couple of things.

Never missed a beat, not
a moment, not an anything.

I was on my chair like a redneck,
just screaming and yelling for him.

Of course, I cried at the end.

Like, how is this possible
that he is this good still?

After all that time and injury
and everything else, unbelievable.

It was just as easy
as the day is long.

It was poetic.

It was phenomenal.

It was everything that is
right and good about the world.

This line of work and, you know, my family
there, out there with my best friend.

After the SummerSlam, that's
when there was a sense of peace

and joy in the midst of
doing your job and your family.

Combining these two worlds
that I've never had together.

And I'm not even
the same person.

And now it all feels so right.

It's as good as it gets.

You know, it's heaven
on earth here in this world.

Shawn Michaels changed
completely as a human being.

And somehow, as a character, he managed to
keep a lot of the aura that he always had.

I could argue that Shawn was
at his best after he came back.

To me, he's the greatest
in-ring performer of all time.

It gets more difficult to find a
new mountain, a new challenge.

Sometimes that new mountain or
that new challenge, it just isn't there.

And so later on in my
career, I learned that when I

disconnect from it,
something will usually happen.

You know, the one with flair is
obviously the one I always speak of.

Remember the
story of Old Yeller?

The Showstopper's gonna take
you, Old Yeller, behind the woodshed.

And put you out of your misery.

I lost myself in that drama.

We had a call from my buddy Kenny,
who's now been made aware of the match.

It's like, oh my goodness.

He said, can you believe it?

It was overwhelming to think that the guy
that we idolized, that we would watch on a

little TV box in
San Antonio, Texas,

somehow their lives
were gonna interconnect.

Rick was his guy.

He absolutely loved Ric Flair.

Kenny took me back to that time.

This was why I went from New York
to Orlando, was to see this moment.

Now in this match, should
Ric Flair lose, he must retire.

I remember feeling like the way Ric Flair
started this match, that he had a chance.

There's no other way to put it.

He carried me.

He gave everything that anybody
could ever give to a match that night.

Wait a minute, wait a minute!

It becomes clear that Ric
Flair just doesn't have enough.

I love this part.

I could tear up
talking about it.

Lair, like an old
dog, still fighting.

He thinks he still has it.

And that's when Shawn sort of has to
have that moment where he says, I'm sorry.

I love you.

Flair wants to fight.

Oh!

And just turns the lights out.

It was as beautiful and perfect an ending
to a wrestling match as you will ever have.

You know, I didn't want to go.

And you said, I love you.

It's a great
moment in wrestling.

I don't care what anybody says.

You can't replace
something like that.

I'm ashamed that it was my love letter
to the wrestling business and to Ric Flair.

It is show day and
we're off to the shizzle.

I've been doing
this for 35 years.

Days like today, it's a different
kind of anxiety that I have now.

I have anxiety for the performers,
for the entire show as a whole.

For me, it's just all fantastic.

Especially when it goes well for them
and they come back and they're jacked.

It's ten times better than
when I had that opportunity.

This is where I'm
supposed to be.

I absolutely love it.

What moment would you
say you're most proud of?

And then by the same token, what
moment would you say you're least proud of?

Most proud, I guess, would
be winning the world title.

And least proud would
probably be the Montreal incident.

One is everything you aspire to do
and the other is the complete opposite.

Something you really
don't want to be a part of.

It's the long-term guilt.

It's the shame.

It's the loathing that you
know this person has for you.

There was so much
bad blood between us.

And I was always like,
if I see him, I'll kill him.

I've always believed that I
had so much anger that I think

it led to my stroke and a lot
of things that I went through.

And then I remember
thinking about Sean and

how we were good
friends once upon a time.

And, you know, that
it wasn't just Sean.

I was guilty too.

And I remember thinking it
would be good to put it to bed.

And I've certainly
talked about my regrets.

And the hope for reconciliation.

It took him some
time to get there.

Vincent suggested, there's got to be a way
we can do this live in front of the world.

I've got 12 years of things
that I want to get off my chest.

I want to call back there and ask
Shawn Michaels to come out here.

I call for a truce.

And I call for you
to shake my hand.

The fact that we did that
in the ring and we shook

hands and all that was
very honest and very sincere.

You know that everybody's watching
when you're trying to have this very real

moment until one another's
part does imitate life.

He's matured and
he's a different guy.

And I thought he finally, you know,
he's got his priorities all in order.

Welcome to the 25th
anniversary of WrestleMania!

70,000 WWE fans!

By the time Shawn Michaels and Undertaker
meet at WrestleMania 25, they're veterans.

They've been around forever.

And somehow, they're actually
both in their absolute prime.

One of my favorite entrances,
Shawn as the Undertaker

but in all white,
ascending from the clouds.

Such a stark contrast
to what I'm about to do.

It's the battle between
heaven and hell.

Prior to 2002, we did not
have a great relationship.

We did not like each
other outside the ring.

This guy, I genuinely like now.

And I've been years and years and
years since we had worked together.

Since the time that he had
injured himself in the casket match.

Unknown to us at the time,
we're about to create one of

the most epic things ever
done in the wrestling business.

There's that fresh arrogance!

70,000, Shannon HBK...

You know when you're in the middle
of something really special, and we did.

I just remember
getting to Shawn.

And we just embraced and
hugged and thanked each other.

It was an awesome moment.

I was on the ride
home the next day.

It's just settling into me that I just
don't know that I'm ever going to...

encounter from a
performance standpoint...

anything greater than that
thing that I experienced last night.

There was only one match that
can be considered match of the year.

Shawn Michaels
and The Undertaker.

Undertaker!

I can beat you.

You and me.

WrestleMania one more time.

So I remember tuning
in to WrestleMania 26.

But I had a knot in my
stomach knowing that if Shawn

Michaels wasn't able to win
this one that he would retire.

But it was a beautiful artistic way to
end the career of Shawn Michaels.

Shawn

Michaels career!

It's over.

My heart was broken.

My heart was broken.

But I'm glad also that he
got to leave on his own terms.

It was important that I
needed to get out of there.

To let the fans show him the
appreciation that he deserves.

You have to imagine that
Tom Brady and Michael

Jordan as much as
they appreciate the fans.

I think more than anything it's about their
teammates and the people that they play.

That means the most to them.

A lot of times there's still a
chasing of that last perfect one.

And that's why I'm so appreciative
that I can define some form of finish line.

There's two things
that I thrive on.

There's two things
that I'm in love with.

Which is, you know, Rebecca and
the kids and the wrestling business.

They're the two greatest loves
of my life that's never changed.

You've probably been
to more ladder matches

than half the people in
the ring I would match.

You've probably been
to more ladder matches

than half the people in
the ring I would match.

It's awesome for me
to have Shawn there.

He'll tell you
what he's thinking.

He'll tell you
what I'm thinking.

And there's a chemistry there.

We have this uncanny
thing with each other.

Shawn's a legend.

And for a legend to walk into
an environment full of performers.

They revere him so much.

NXT TakeOver!

There is the North
American Championship.

Who will climb the ladder?

Shawn has been a role model
both in and out of the ring.

I have so much
respect for that man.

For not just what he's done
for professional wrestling.

The type of person he is.

To me and so many
others, he's the greatest.

And it's insane how kind,
generous and humble the guy is.

Good stuff.

Sometimes I think he doesn't
realize that he's Shawn Michaels.

When you said, a tale of
two lives, that's what it's been.

Believe it or not, the same
business that might have almost

killed me, I think it's the
same business that saved me.

You did a great job.

These guys are
easy to work with.

That was freaking awesome.

I know I accomplished
more than what I wanted.

I've never lost touch
with a 19-year-old dude

that was hoping to have
a car and an apartment.

And be the Southwest
Heavyweight Champion.

A lot more has
happened since then.