"You stupid old man, I'm a snake!"
-CM Punk, ROH Death Before Dishonor III, June 18, 2005
Setting: WWF Survivor Series 1997, Bell Centre, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, November 9, 1997
As WWF World Heavyweight Champion Bret Hart and WWF European Heavyweight Champion Shawn Michaels are brawling through their match, Bret hits the Russian Legsweep. To everyone's shock, he grabs Shawn and throws Shawn on top of him and demands that referee Earl Hebner count the pin. Bret has a look of utter insanity on his face and Hebner is too afraid to refuse. Hebner counts 1-2-3 and calls for the bell. Shawn gets off of Bret, unsure of what just happened. Bret rolls out to the floor, grabs the belt, rolls back in the ring, stands up and wraps the belt around Shawn's waist. Bret then rolls out of the ring and he is laughing like he's crazy. He then rubs his fingers together to symbolize how much money he is going to be making in WCW. The fans, who had been behind Bret the whole match, suddenly start booing him. Vince whispers something to Jim Ross.
JIM ROSS: "Fans, I am not sure what just happened. My only guess is that the pressures of being Champion and his hatred of Shawn Michaels have caused Bret Hart to snap. I have known him for years and I have never, ever seen him act like that. Well, it seems that Shawn Michaels is the new WWF World Heavyweight Champion. I don't know. Thanks for watching, good night, and we'll see you tomorrow night on RAW IS WAR!"
__________________________________________________________________________This was initially inspired by this thread from the WWWF/WWF (1963-1983) board on the Kayfabe Memories Message Board about The Blackjacks' short WWWF World Tag Team Title reign and Blackjack Mulligan leaving for NWA Mid-Atlantic. There is a passage from an interview where Mulligan talks about pulling a stunt to drop the belts, since, according to him, Vince J. McMahon didn't want him to leave. The story is debunked in the thread, but, I thought it would have been wild if Bret had pulled something like that instead of the STUPID FINISH OF DOOM happening. I also thought of the CM Punk quote mentioned above and the Brian Pillman-Kevin Sullivan "I respect you, bookerman!" worked shoot from WCW SuperBrawl VI. If I had pitched this idea on the board, I'd probably get kicked off of it. Hopefully, you readers here will be more appreciative.