Rumors about Triple H sabotaging WWE match are false, legend claims
Triple H did not purposely have a bad match with Scott Steiner at the 2003 WWE Royal Rumble, according to Jim Ross.
The Game lost via disqualification after attacking his opponent with a sledgehammer. The 17-minute bout was widely viewed as a disappointment, with Steiner's lack of in-ring conditioning a major talking point after the show.
Ross, a WWE commentator and executive at the time, spoke about the event on his Grilling JR podcast. The legendary announcer dismissed talk that The King of Kings deliberately sabotaged the match to make Steiner look bad:
"No, hell no," Ross replied when asked about the speculation. "Triple H is not gonna go out there and have a stinker on purpose. No. It's gonna sound bad, he's a professional (…) His ego, and I say that in a good way, he's got a lot of pride, he's not gonna go out there and stink up the joint on purpose." [1:13:17 – 1:13:44]
Steiner was part of the WCW Nitro roster that went head-to-head with WWE's flagship show RAW during the Attitude Era. In 2020, he claimed Triple H wanted to beat anyone associated with WCW, including himself, Kevin Nash, and Sting.
Jim Ross questions the Scott Steiner vs. Triple H finish
Scott Steiner did not regularly wrestle for several months before returning to action with WWE in December 2002.
I don't get the excessive hate for Triple H vs. Scott Steiner @ Royal Rumble '03. The promo for the match is amazing, and the match itself is not as bad as everyone remembers it to be. Please reconsider watching it because its been a while and you might enjoy it. https://t.co/TBPTt2yVjY
Jim Ross added that Triple H likely had to improvise during the match when he realized Steiner was not yet in good ring shape:
"He couldn't do any more with Scotty, and they needed to call some audibles, and one of those audibles would have been to shorten up the match. The second audible would have been that Triple H went over. I don't know that the DQ thing, who did it save? I think DQ finishes are so overused, and they don't mean as much as maybe they did in a previous generation." [1:13:45 – 1:14:10]
Long-time WWE creative team member Bruce Prichard also discussed the match on his podcast in 2017. He said Steiner was "running out of gas" at live events in the build-up to the Royal Rumble.
Do you have any memories of the infamous match? Let us know in the comments section below.
Please credit Grilling JR and give a H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling for the transcription if you use quotes from this article.