Shawn Michaels Wants Today’s Stars To Be More Professional Than He Was

For those unaware, Shawn Michaels was not the most professional professional wrestler during the 90s. This caused a number of issues with other members of the WWE roster, particularly Bret Hart and The Undertaker.

Now, Michaels is much older and much more mature and he wants NXT talent to voice their opinion more professionally than he did. Here is the quote from Michaels’ appearance on the Getting Over podcast, courtesy of Fightful:

“I still encourage participation, let’s say. Again, I always try to make it very clear, please try to understand it’s not the same world, it’s not the same business. It’s so much bigger. Nobody should handle it the way that I handled it. But, I have to balance that with honesty and that is letting them know that I can’t say for sure that if I didn’t at least push myself and push the system a little bit, I don’t know if I would have gotten where I got.

It’s always important creatively to be finding the next big thing, the next movement. If you’re standing still, plateauing, that’s okay, but I would always encourage our guys and gals to push for more. I always use the line that Vince gave me years ago, which is, ‘Look, Shawn, I want you to just go out there and go for it, and I’ll reel you in.’

This generation does it with a lot more sense and sensibility, certainly, than I did. Again, I think they’ve got a nice balance. To answer your question, I do encourage them to push themselves and to continue to evolve and try to grow as performers because I feel like they would get stagnant and, as you say, complacent. look, that’s a delicate balance for them to have to adjust to and they have got to do it on their time. I always make sure to tell them, don’t do it if it’s out of your nature. But if it’s something you passionately feel and think you’re going to feel better, at least expressing it — as long as it’s expressed professionally and well-mannered– Certainly, and NXT everybody’s allowed to have a voice. You just can’t have the voice that I had 25 years ago.”

Shawn Michaels has been working behind the scenes at NXT as of late.

What are your thoughts on the above story? Let us know in the comments on Twitter or Facebook.