Vince McMahon rejected former WWE star's pitch to work with Steve Austin
Duke 'The Dumpster' Droese has revealed Vince McMahon shot down his idea to form a faction with WWE legend Steve Austin.
Droese worked for WWE from May 1994 to July 1996. His most notable WWE match came in February 1996 when he lost to Triple H at In Your House 6.
Speaking to Kee On Sports’ Vince McKee, Droese opened up about his two years working for Vince McMahon’s company. The 52-year-old also gave details about a pitch that the WWE Chairman rejected:
"At one point I was riding with Steve Austin, and he states he doesn’t remember this happening," Droese said. "That’s okay, but me and him went into Vince’s office at TV and pitched him an idea where we were gonna do a gimmick where it was gonna kind of be almost like skinheads, a skinhead kind of gimmick.
"Not racist or anything, you know, just a group of guys with shaved heads and Steve would be the freaking mastermind and I would be one of his henchmen, and we would just beat up other groups of people, and they would just happen to be a group of African-Americans, a group of Hispanic people, this group, that group, whatever groups you had. Basically, I was pitching him an idea of having factions and he shot it down."
Duke Droese added that he said the words “Generation X type gimmick” to Vince McMahon in the meeting. D-Generation X went on to become one of the greatest factions in WWE history, but Droese said he cannot take any credit for their name.
Vince McMahon had different ideas for Steve Austin
Five months before Duke Droese’s WWE departure, Steve Austin made his WWE debut on the January 8, 1996 episode of RAW.
Austin originally appeared in WWE as The Ringmaster before being known as Stone Cold Steve Austin. He faced Droese at several live events in June 1996 but their idea of creating a faction never came to fruition.
Around the time of Duke Droese’s exit, Vince McMahon booked Steve Austin as the winner of the 1996 King of the Ring tournament. That event, which featured Austin’s famous “Austin 3:16” promo, was one of the first steps in the WWE legend’s rise to superstardom.
Please credit Kee On Sports’ Vince McKee and give a H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling for the transcription if you use quotes from this article.