After 19 years of retirement, “Stone Cold” Steve Austin returned to the ring at WWE WrestleMania 38 and defeated Kevin Owens in a no-holds-barred match.
In the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer of F4WOnline.com wrote the following in regards to Austin’s decision to have a match:
“It was to be billed as a match but Austin didn’t want to have a bad match so the plan was for an elongated brawl lasting several minutes. After training, Austin felt comfortable enough to do a match.”
In other Austin/WrestleMania news, Pat McAfee noted the following about Austin’s rehearsal during his podcast:
“He [Austin] was working on coming out. And, you know, we’re in a different era now of the WWE than we were then. So, I got to watch this dude’s entrance within an empty stadium or whatever. He goes right to that top rope, f**king both fingers straight up in the air. He’s doing his whole thing. Then I see three producers running over [to him] ‘Can’t do that. Can’t do that.’ So he does it again. ‘Can’t do that.’
He was like, ‘Alright.’ So he just put his fist up or whatever. As I was watching him [at the show], I was wondering, ‘There’s no way he keeps that middle finger down, the middle finger from Steve Austin is coming at some point.’ Then last night, he had a couple.”
