Mark Henry has been lucky enough to have a Hall of Fame worthy career in the world of professional wrestling, but there’s one specific moment from his career that fans still talk about to this very day.
During an episode of Monday Night Raw in June of 2013, Henry made his way out to the ring in his infamous salmon colored jacket to announce his retirement. The former WWE World Heavyweight Champion delivered an emotional speech which got many people invested in what he was saying before he swerved everyone and hit John Cena with the World’s Strongest Slam and continued on with his wrestling career.
Recently Mark Henry spoke to The Attitude Era podcast about the fake retirement angle, and he revealed that it was Vince McMahon who came up with the idea to trick everyone into thinking he was done.
“You know what man, during that time I was actually — my contract was expiring, and I was thinking about taking a break. And so I went probably about six, eight months basically really preparing myself for retirement. So it was like 50-50 [whether he’d retire or not]. And then Vince talked to me and said, ‘You know what? I think this would be a really good time to really pull the wool over people. Everybody thinks you’re going to retire. You won’t re-sign, like what’s the deal? Is it more money, this or that?’ I said, ‘No.’ It’s like, ‘It’s not the money, I just want to go home.’ When you’re on the road for like 18 years, and I was missing stuff, seeing my kids growing up. And at that point I was like, ‘Man, I’m done, I made enough money. Let me go and you know, be the dad that I always wanted to be.’ And it ended up being Vince talked me into it, and all of that emotion and the reality of it was true. It’s just that I ended up putting it into the show.”
“It ended up being one of the best moments in pro wrestling history. I had people calling me, I didn’t even know how they got my phone number. Hulk Hogan called me. I was like, ‘How in the hell did you get my number?’ And he was like, ‘Look, you pulled the wool over my eyes. And it’s been a long time since that happened, you should be proud.’ And I was proud.”
What was your reaction to Mark Henry’s fake retirement speech? Sound off in the comments below.
H/T 411Mania.com
