Vince McMahon Took Title Win Away From WWE Hall Of Famer
A creative decision made by Vince McMahon prevented a WWE Hall of Famer from winning a title at WrestleMania.
Rey Mysterio is a legendary WWE superstar who is still active in the company while already being in the Hall of Fame. After wrestling for over 30 years, Rey has done it all and won it all in his spectacular career.
For most of his WWE run, Vince McMahon was the Chairman of the company and the man in charge of the creative process.
After WCW closed in March 2001, Rey joined WWE over a year later in the summer of 2002. Rey’s first WrestleMania was the 19th edition in 2003 in Seattle. At that show, a heel Matt Hardy successfully defended the Cruiserweight Title in a match that only went about six minutes.
While looking back at that time, Matt Hardy revealed on his Extreme Life With Matt Hardy podcast that Mysterio was going to win the Cruiserweight Title at WrestleMania 19 until plans changed.
“The WrestleMania 19 finish, the initial plan when we were doing it, he was gonna win there. I was gonna win the title, carry it for a little bit, then Rey was gonna win it at WrestleMania 19, but Vince liked what I was doing so much, he said, ‘I’m gonna change the finish.’
This only happened a day or two before we actually got to WrestleMania 19. He said, ‘I’m gonna change the finish. I’m gonna have you beat Rey and retain the title and we’re gonna drag this out because I love what you’re doing so much.'”
Vince McMahon Continued The Hardy/Mysterio Rivalry Past WrestleMania
As he continued, Hardy talked about how Vince McMahon made sure the feud continued after WrestleMania.
“Whenever I wrestled him at WrestleMania, that was going to be the end of it.
We were just gonna do that and do it at WrestleMania, but Vince liked what we were doing and working together so much, he was gonna drag that out and we were gonna end up doing the blow-off match with the Cruiserweight title near Anaheim, Southern California, so that it would be a big deal for Rey whenever he won the Cruiserweight title, and it ended up being the main event of SmackDown, so that was really, really cool.”
Rey Mysterio would go on to hold WWE’s version of the Cruiserweight Title three times in his career along with three WWE World Title wins and many other accomplishments.