Following night two of WrestleMania 38 my younger brother–fellow TheOvertimer writer Tardell Swift–came in and told me about Stone Cold Steve Austin giving people the Stone Cold Stunner. However, he did it in a way where you have to guess who took the best Stunner. I went with McAfee, Austin Theory, and Vince McMahon in that order. Looking back, Theory was hit with the Stunner as if he’d stuck a fork in a socket and had gotten blown away.
I loved it. Meanwhile, Pat McAfee kind of took the Stone Cold Stunner and bump. It was a Stunner, booze spit, basic bump, and sell, nothing too fancy or sizzle-worthy but it was hard to mess up and the guy did it perfectly. It was the funny sell you want at WrestleMania sometimes.
Mick Foley Asks the Question of Our Time: Was Steve Austin’s Final Stunner to Vince McMahon the “Worst Stunner Ever?”
Then we get Vince McMahon, the guy who took one of the best Stunners when the “Texas Rattlesnake” first started his rebellious streak during the Attitude Era. Now, Vince is almost 80 while Steve Austin is almost 60. However, they were both there and it was anticipated that he would take the Stunner.
That raises the question of who thought this was going to be a decent Stunner bump or sell? I’m sure most did. Even though he’s 76, McMahon has probably taken more Stone Cold Stunners than anyone in the WWE and most of them weren’t even in a match.
He didn’t need to jump up, flip, and flop nor did he need to jump up and bump. Hell, he didn’t even need to do the Slaughter-snap bump or Slaughter-rolling bump. Vince just had to be there to take the Stunner, fall, and sell it.
The above was not what happened—it was not. It was a sloppy-looking affair and it’s hard to see who was to blame. Vince McMahon had the coordination of The Sandman after downing a six-pack and a half before getting into the ring.
For sure. 🫣😂 pic.twitter.com/753ohCQpk8
— Marvin. (@Marv2punkt0) April 4, 2022
Stone Cold had delivered several Stunners over the weekend, so he wasn’t going to f*** anything up, folks. However, there was some fumbling here. Vince had to be corralled into the Stunner—most likely to reduce the chance of injury—only for it to not be worth executing anyway.
It was the wrestling equivalent of ordering a meal but it wasn’t cooked right or something was put on it that you didn’t order—but you eat it anyway because it’s already here and you’re not going to wait another 15-20 minutes for servers to get it right.
Austin and McMahon were in the ring, they were already drinking beers, everyone knew what was coming, and Austin give Vince the boot. Sh** goes south off the bat but we’re already here, we might as well ride this out, right? It goes from smooth, to manageable, to “F*** it, we’ll do it live!” really fast.
Mick Foley took to Twitter and asked “Worst stunner ever?” I’d put this as the fourth or fifth worst Stunner but put an asterisk next to it purely because it took place at WrestleMania and it would have to be top three because of it.
https://twitter.com/RealMickFoley/status/1510817636459945985
If it had been on an episode of RAW it would’ve been like “OK, that was ass. Don’t do that at the event.” With that said, the worst Stone Stunner goes to Linda McMahon and her WWE 2K desync issues bump. Linda McMahon took the Stunner like a wrestler in a bugged copy of WWF Attitude.
So, no Mick, this wasn’t the worst Stunner ever but it is definitely one of the top two worst WrestleMania Stunners ever. However, the blame isn’t on Austin who tried to position McMahon as best as he could, or Vince McMahon for simply aging. It was on the person who figured “This is necessary as Austin’s final WrestleMania Stunner to Vinnie Mac.”
I don’t want to blame Vince for another poor decision but…it was 95-percent likely that Vince came out with this one, folks.
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