After WWE acquired WCW fans waited patiently for the WCW stars to arrive on WWE programming. Buff Bagwell made his debut with WWE when he faced Booker T on the July 2, 2001 episode of Raw, but things quickly went south for Bagwell.
During a recent interview with Chris Van Vliet, the former WCW star explained that right before he made his way out into the arena to make his big TV debut with WWE, Shane McMahon threatened to fire him if he looked at the cameras.
“We were in Tacoma, Washington and the next week is Atlanta. Now you are Vince McMahon, are you going to put us in Tacoma, or are you going to wait seven days and put us in Atlanta? They call it the Invasion, what are we invading, Alaska? Little things I never told anybody, they were about to play my music and Booker went out first. Think about it, he had 2 belts, and I went out second, I never saw that before. He may have not got music, I will have to check that.
But my pyro was off the charts, here was what I was told ten seconds before I came through the curtain. Out of nowhere, like a ghost, Shane McMahon appears. He says, ‘Mark, you can’t look in the cameras?’ I go, ‘What?’ He goes, ‘You can’t look in the cameras.’ I go, ‘Shane, that’s all I do. I look in the cameras, I pose and wear the top hat, that is my whole gig, bro.’ He says, ‘You can’t do it or you’re fired.’
I want you to watch a Buff Bagwell match anytime the year before, and then watch that match. I don’t look anywhere near that camera the whole time in three years. That takes me completely out of my world. I come out, do the pyro, do the posing, but then it is like where is the camera? I see it and I start talking to someone over here, I was out of my game right there. They took my leg off right there. I was told not to look in the camera or I was fired.”
Ultimately Buff Bagwell’s stint with WWE didn’t last all that long as he was released from the company shortly after he made his debut in July of 2001.
