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Tony Schiavone Talks Lying To Talent, Says Dirtsheets Exposed The Business

When Hulk Hogan turned heel at the 1996 Bash At The Beach pay-per-view and joined Scott Hall and Kevin Nash to form the nWo it set the wrestling world on fire. But Tony Schiavone recently said on an episode of What Happened When that he was just as surprised to know as everyone else.

He said in the weeks leading up to the event when Kevin Nash and Scott Hall made veiled references to Sting, Macho Man, and Hulk Hogan that Tony thought those might be the three WCW workers going against the Outsiders. Schiavone said for all he knew they were bringing in someone else from the WWE to be Hall and Nash’s third man.

When asked what he thought about working the boys backstage he said he thought there was nothing wrong with lying to talent that wasn’t concerned with a certain angle. In the end lying to the boys backstage can protect the business.

“There were a lot of things kept away from me and sometimes I didn’t like it because I thought that maybe I needed to know something as part of my job and that’s something that we can get into as we move on. But working the boys, when it worked was spectacular. [Hogan’s heel turn] was one of the times.”

“I guess going back and a guy like Ric [Flair] and a guy like Bruce Prichard going back and looking at it right now think, ‘oh we should have known everything’. No — you didn’t need to know everything and it worked back then because the more — listen it’s like any other thing. The more people are pulled into a secret the more chance it is to get out there and someone know it.”

“I’m gonna sh-t on the dirtsheets again, but they claimed that they really didn’t expose the business — bullsh-t they didn’t. And if it got out there from the boys to the dirtsheets and the dirtsheets put it out there then the business was exposed what they were gonna do. So I think it was a good thing to work the boys. I really do.”

If you use any portion of the quotes in this article please credit What Happened When with a H/T to Still Real To Us for the transcription

Aaron Varble

Aaron Varble hasn’t just been writing for more than a decade in various formats including sketch comedy, stand up, television, radio, and other various projects; nor is he just another professional wrestling fan with a master's degree in journalism and Tourette’s syndrome. He's always looking to explore the why not with the why and the how come along with the how. Follow on Twitter @TheVarble