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Despite a prolific professional wrestling career, Triple H has had a handful of forgettable matches. The Ultimate Warrior infamously squashed Triple H at WrestleMania 12 in 1996, and fans remember the match for all the wrong reasons.
Bruce Prichard spoke about the WrestleMania 12 contest on his Something to Wrestle podcast with Conrad Thompson. The WWE Creative Team's Executive Director revealed that while The Ultimate Warrior's entrance looked impressive, Prichard hated the match that followed.
"Absolutely hated it. The entrance was cool. The entrance with the pyro and the Warrior symbol and all that sh** was pretty cool. But, beyond that, I hated it," Bruce Prichard said.
After a four-year hiatus, the Ultimate Warrior returned to the company in 1996, and his win at WrestleMania 12 was considered inevitable.
The Ultimate Warrior had a massive fanbase, but he had been away from professional wrestling for too long. Many fans had even lost hope of seeing the former WWE Champion back in the company. However, Warrior returned, and WWE booked him for a match against Triple H - a rising heel at the time.
"I think so, especially at that time, yes. I think there was a big part of the audience that maybe thought they would never see him back. So, it was a big deal for him to come back, and Warrior had his fans. Warrior had a fanbase, but I just, I hated it," Prichard said.
Vince McMahon was unhappy with the Triple H vs Ultimate Warrior WrestleMania match
Prichard recalled Vince McMahon's reaction to the match. The WWE chairman was unhappy to see how the match unfolded. The Ultimate Warrior wasn't affected by Triple H's pedigree and instead proceeded to beat him in one minute thirty-six seconds.
"I'm pretty sure I was doing Gorilla this night. Yes. Not happy about it. Vince watched it on air live, (he) wasn't really happy with it. I was just pissed off about it. I felt that it was abusing the fact that Vince wasn't there backstage, and it was not; it wasn't good. I didn't think that it did really much for Warrior. If Warrior just beat a piece of sh**, then he just beat a piece of sh**. If he beat a guy that, you know, was out there and gave him some kind of challenge, then it would have been a bigger win. So, for me, I just was not happy. I knew it beforehand, and I was not happy with it when they went to the ring, and I was even less happy when they came back. So, I didn't like it. I hated it," Bruce Prichard said.
Prichard concluded by highlighting a different path the WWE could have taken for The Ultimate Warrior's highly-publicized return instead of making Triple H a scapegoat.
"I thought we just squashed Hunter and didn't do anything. If that's all we were going to do, we could have just said, 'Hey, Warrior returns at WrestleMania and send Mario Mancini out there to do that."
Thankfully, the Cerebral Assassin recovered from the loss and went on to have a Hall of Fame career. Triple H still has a few more matches left in him. However, he also admitted to rejecting a 2-time WWE Champion's backstage request for a match.
Please credit Something to Wrestle with Bruce Prichard and give an H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling for the transcription if you use quotes from this article.
