"Pat Patterson told the women to break my legs" - Former referee shares startling details of first WWE match
Former WWE referee Rita Chatterton has revealed that Pat Patterson told multiple female performers to break her leg during her debut match in the company.
Chatterton was the first female referee to be employed by WWE, and she admitted to having a horrible experience even before she began officially working for the promotion. Despite Pat Patterson being against the idea of having a female referee, Rita Chatterton was given a chance to officiate the match after she threatened to sue the company.
The WWE Hall of Famer wanted to teach Chatterton a lesson and urged the performers to get physical with the referee. However, the stars that featured in the bout ended up helping Rita, as she revealed on the Cheap Heat Productions podcast:
"I ended up doing my very first match, a women's tag team match, and I found a few months later that Pat Patterson told the women to break my legs and make sure I never wanted to get into the ring again," revealed Chatterton. "Luckily, the women, instead of doing anything to hurt me, they helped me. That's how I got started! It was a crazy world, and things were so much different back then. But luckily, the women knew that you had to work ten times as hard for the quarter of the recognition that the men got at the time. So, instead of doing anything to hurt me, they actually helped me."
Rita Chatterton reveals what Pat Patterson told her before her WWE debut
It's a known fact that women weren't always given equal opportunities in WWE. Rita Chatterton almost missed out on appearing for the company for the same reason.
Chatterton recalled arriving at the venue for her first WWE match, and much to her surprise, she was confronted by the legendary Pat Patterson.
The former Intercontinental Champion initially didn't buy into Chatterton's claims that she was in attendance to officiate a match and proceeded to examine her refereeing license.
"I'm leaning against my car, and Pat Patterson comes walking over, and he says, 'Who are you here with?' Well, I'm here with myself, I said. He said, 'This is for the wrestlers; you can't do that here.' Well, I'm your referee for tonight, and he started laughing at me," Rita continued. "He said, 'Sweetheart, you've got to do better than that. I've been around for 30 years; you're no referee. I was like, 'Well, do you want to see my license?' He is like, 'Yeah.'" continued Chatterton.
A visibly stunned Pat Patterson didn't react positively after checking the license and threw it right back at the former referee with some unwanted force. He also made quite an astonishing comment before walking away in anger, as Rita stated below:
"So I went to my car, I get my license and handed him my license. He looks at my license, he looks at me, and he looks back at the license, and he looks at me, and he is just shaking his head, and he literally throws the license at me and says, 'Who in their right f**king mind would give a female a referee's license?' And he stormed away," added the former referee.
My Guest on the show this week is WWE’s first womens referee . Rita Marie Chatterton for her first video interview since 1992 ! Please subscribe to the channel to see it first youtube.com/c/CheapHeatPro… #ritachatterton #wwf #referee https://t.co/Q59ukZfgXJ
Rita Chatterton, who previously accused Vince McMahon of raping her in 1986, also reacted to the recent sexual misconduct allegations against the WWE boss, and you can read more on that right here.
When using quotes from this article, please credit the Cheap Heat Productions podcast and give a H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling.