Paul Heyman has revealed the WWE legend Vince McMahon wouldn’t budge on him using in ECW.
While current WWE fans know Paul Heyman for his role as “The Wise Man” of Roman Reigns and The Bloodline, long-time wrestling fans remember him as the mastermind behind ECW.
Due to ECW’s association with WWE, several stars from Vince McMahon’s promotion appeared in the company, such as Taz and Jerry Lawler. However, there was one prominent name that Vince just wouldn’t allow Heyman to use in his company.
On Friday’s edition of Busted Open Radio, former ECW Champion Tommy Dreamer discussed his backstage work starting in Extreme Championship Wrestling and then eventually into WWE.
Recalling when ECW initially made an alliance with WWE in 1996 as a channel to help cultivate unsung talent laying dormant on the WWE roster, the extreme promotion helped showcase Doug Furnas, Phil Lafon and most notably Al Snow.
On the WWE and ECW relationship as well as the one name that Vince didn’t allow Heyman to use, Dreamer said:
“Real, real cool revolutionary stuff. I remember Paul [Heyman] being like, ‘Give me that guy.’ That guy was The Rock.”
“They were doing nothing with him. Paul saw something with him, even back then, and Vince wouldn’t let him go. Would that have been awesome to have The Rock under the ECW Original banner? Yes, but it didn’t happen.”
Dreamer did note that The Rock was a big ECW fan too, but at that time, WWE didn’t see the potential of “The People’s Champion.”
Thankfully for the wrestling world, Vince McMahon and company eventually saw what “The Great One” was capable of.
Transcription via Wrestling Inc.
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