Vince McMahon's Direction Burned Bridges With WWE's Most Dominant All-Time Champion

If there was one constant regarding former WWE Chairman Vince McMahon prior to his WWE career ending thanks to Janel Grant's ongoing sex trafficking lawsuit against him, it was that there was no consistency of any kind. This included McMahon's often maligned booking over his last few years in charge, and his relationships with some of his most famous stars. Over the years, McMahon would go from friendly to falling out to becoming friendly again with many notable names that worked under his umbrella, including Bret Hart, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, The Ultimate Warrior (who McMahon fired and rehired twice), Hulk Hogan, and countless others. There's a strong argument that no one in wrestling burned bridges like McMahon, only to then build them back up like McMahon did.

Then there's Bruno Sammartino, the original top star of WWE who also famously fell out with McMahon. In a way, that was to be expected. Many will recall that Sammartino's time as WWE's marquee star didn't occur under McMahon's watch, but instead that of his father, Vincent J. McMahon, during the 1960s and 70s. By the time the younger McMahon had taken the reins of WWE in the early 1980s, Sammartino wasn't even in WWE, and in fact had sued McMahon Sr. over unpaid royalties, a lawsuit McMahon settled out of court. It was only that development that prompted Sammartino to return to WWE to work for the younger McMahon in 1984, first as a commentator, then later as a part-time wrestler. It was only when Sammartino left WWE for good in 1988 that the heat between him and McMahon began to boil, and simmered up until Sammartino was finally inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2013.

What differentiated Sammartino's fallout with McMahon from other notable names was it had little to do with money or creative disagreements. Instead, Sammartino seemed to take issue with several factors, the first being with the overall change in the WWE product, particularly when it came to McMahon's philosophy of style over substance. Having been a product of 1960s and 70s wrestling, which focused more on athleticism and presenting the idea of legitimacy, Sammartino was not a fan of McMahon moving wrestling away from that and more towards spectacle and cartoonish, larger than life characters. In later years, Sammartino would also come down hard on the WWE Attitude Era, believing many of the storylines to be vulgar and inappropriate for a business that was more family friendly in Sammartino's time.

But those philosophical clashes weren't Sammartino's only, or biggest, issue with McMahon's WWE. What bothered him even more was the rampant use of steroids and performance enhancing drugs that took place in WWE under McMahon's watch, a scandal that would eventually see McMahon tried by the federal government. Though McMahon was ultimately acquitted, it didn't stop Sammartino from launching some of his harshest barbs at the WWE Chairman, especially when Sammartino became a frequent talking head about drug issues in wrestling for platforms such as CNN, "The Phil Donahue Show," and "Geraldo." During these appearances, Sammartino referred to WWE wrestlers as "druggies," and at one point questioned WWE's drug testing protocols, which began in the early 90s. With fighting words like that, it's not hard to see why it took so long for the wounds between Sammartino and WWE to heal.