Stone Cold Steve Austin Reflects on Possible In-Ring Return, WrestleMania 40 Absence, and Unmade Dream Matches – During a wide-ranging interview on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, WWE Hall of Famer “Stone Cold” Steve Austin offered rare and candid insight into his current mindset, his physical condition, and several long-standing questions surrounding his legendary career. The conversation touched on everything from a possible in-ring comeback to why fans never saw him face CM Punk, Goldberg, or Hulk Hogan, along with clarity on his absence from WrestleMania 40.

When asked if he still looks capable of competing in the ring, Austin didn’t shy away from the idea.

“I could. God dang it. And just saying that takes me back to when we did that WrestleMania match with Kevin Owens in Dallas, Texas, and they didn’t send a ring down for me to work out in to get any kind of timing or hit the ropes. I remember going down there, and I was running the ropes and taking a couple of flat back bumps before we got into the ring, but you can’t get your timing or any kind of anything back, much less your wind. I was over here in my gym doing all kinds of cardio, because when that glass breaks, or whoever’s music hits, and you start walking to the ring, man, just the buzz of the crowd. I’ve seen people blow up walking to the ring, because that’s just what a crowd can do to you. So just going there with Kevin Owens and trying to have that match with him, where we didn’t bill it as a match, but it was going to be a match, so to speak. I remember telling Kevin, and I was knocking the shit out of him. I was potatoing him so bad because I hadn’t thrown a punch in 19 years, and he never threw a receipt. I told him, because we keep in touch with each other every now and then. I just wish that he could have been in the ring with me when I was really going, you know, full speed and had my timing, because he’s a great worker, and I really like him a lot. I wish he would have got a chance to experience me when I was in my prime, because that would have been a great contest. But I could still do it, and I’m not advocating for nothing, so I’m not selling a match here, Chris. But you asked me, could I? Yes.”

Austin was then asked if he would actually wrestle again.

“Probably not. I’ll say that, but you say never. But with the knee replacement I had last year? God dang, I was limping around so bad, and I didn’t know I was limping, and people would ask me, ‘What’s wrong?’ I said, ‘What are you talking about?’ [They said] ‘You’re limping.’ Fuck, I didn’t know, because I don’t watch myself walk. And then finally, after everybody kept pointing it out to me, I could feel it, no doubt that’s why I was limping. And then it just started getting really bad because of all the arthritis in there. And finally, last year, I had it replaced. I was thinking why didn’t I do this sooner to get out of so much pain? I’ve always wondered what arthritis felt like. Man, I found out firsthand. It’s chronically over time, years and years and years of it. It’ll change your personality. It just puts you in a state of mind where you just want some relief, so to get that relief and come out on the other side and still be active.”

Austin was also asked a lighter question about who took the worst Stunner.

“Easily Vince is the worst.”

When pressed on whether that was worse than Linda McMahon, Austin elaborated.

“Well, because there’s multiple occasions with Vince where, Jesus, you can screw one up. Of course, me and Linda, she was like a second mom to me. I didn’t see her often, but when she was there, she was just so nice to me, and we would always have great conversations. So I felt bad that that one didn’t turn out good. But Vince had so many opportunities, and they were always so awful, especially the one at WrestleMania [where I wrestled] Kevin Owens, it was just terrible. So I had to start laughing, because you got to let everybody know that, hey, that’s really bad. Rock took a good one. Scott Hall took a good one. A bunch of people. There’s so many, I can’t list them all.”

Addressing speculation about WrestleMania 40, Austin explained why he ultimately didn’t appear.

“Things just didn’t line up. I had other things going on. I remember when they pitched that to me. I said, dude, I got some things going on. I don’t see myself being there. That was way in advance. Was it pitched to me, or did they want me there? Yeah. But I wasn’t in a position to go.”

He added further context when asked if it was ever a real possibility.

“No, there was a possibility that I could have been there had I chose to go there. I had other shit going on. WWE is this multi-billion dollar corporation. I got a metal shop that we’re sitting in. So sometimes the multi-billion dollar company has an idea that the dude that has the metal shop [should make an appearance], it just don’t work. So it didn’t work. I’m over here in my metal shop. I like to do as much as I can with WWE when it works, when it works for them, when it works for me, and when it’s going to be fun. But in that and saying that not everything lines up on a timeline basis, I had other sht going on.”

Austin also addressed one of the most talked-about “what if” matches in modern WWE history.

“It was teased at one time, we were promoting a video game, and I think I just had an ACL, PCL [surgery]. Maybe it was teased, but it just never happened, just like me and Hogan never [happened]. Many things never happened. There’s so much good shit that did happen. Not everything can happen.”

Finally, he explained why fans never saw Stone Cold face Goldberg.

“I don’t know. I think we pitched it when he first came in, but he wasn’t at the level that he needed to be. He had just come into WWF, and he needed to get going or get over first. He was certainly over from his WCW days. I think a little bit of time had elapsed, but I watched him down there in Atlanta, but we were all on the road at the time, and that was during the Monday Night Wars. If you set your DVR to record back in the day, you kind of knew what was going on. I watched Dallas Page kind of go down a parallel path as me too as far as this timeline of getting over. But yeah, you know, Goldberg just needed to put some time in WWF before we could go, and then it just never happened. Bill is a good friend of mine.”

Stone Cold Steve Austin Reflects on Possible In-Ring Return, WrestleMania 40 Absence, and Unmade Dream Matches

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