Freddie Prinze Jr. Names Word That Would Cause Vince McMahon To Go Off

During his time at the top of the wrestling industry, former WWE Chairman and CEO Vince McMahon had a reputation for, well, a lot of things. One of his most well-known quirks was that he banned certain words from being spoken by WWE personnel. According to actor and former WWE writer Freddie Prinze Jr., one of those words was "belt."

Prinze spoke about the issue on his "Wrestling with Freddie" podcast. "You weren't even allowed to say 'belt' when Vince McMahon was running things," Prinze said. "You had to say 'title' or 'championship.' I think those were the only two things you could say."

"Belt" isn't the only word that would set McMahon off. "If you said 'strap,' oh, Vince would just go off, man. 'Aw, godd*****, did he just say strap? Jesus Christ, promo s***,'" Prinze said in his best McMahon impersonation. "He would go off on one word, and the rest of the promo would be dope, and he wouldn't even hear it."

In the past, lists of words banned by the company have circulated online. Some, such as "kill'"or "strangle" make sense to keep off a television show that's watched by children. Others, such as "DQ'"or "card" just seem like overkill.

After McMahon's retirement this past July, one of the first edicts from new Chief Content Officer Paul 'Triple H' Levesque was a loosening of the company's on-air vocabulary restrictions. No longer were words and phrases such as "wrestling" or "match of the year" considered forbidden terms among talent. However, it's unclear just how much of the list of banned words has been done away with under Levesque's creative leadership.

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "Wrestling with Freddie" with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.