"He grilled the sh** out of him" - Vince McMahon was in a problematic situation just before meeting him, according to former WWE personality

Former WWE Chairman Vince McMahon was in the middle of an extremely tough situation just before he met Jason Sensation for the first time.

Sensation, famous for his work in WWE imitating Owen Hart, met Vince McMahon in a break during the former chairman's interview on Off The Record with Michael Landsberg.

On February 24, 1998, McMahon was on the show to talk about WCW, Ted Turner, WWE, and the controversy during the 1997 Survivor Series with Bret Hart - more infamously known as The Montreal Screwjob.

On the Cafe de Rene podcast, Sensation talked about meeting Vince McMahon for the first time. He mentioned that the then-President of WWF Canada, Carl De Marco, invited him to TSN's Off The Record interview with McMahon.

Sensation arrived to find the chairman being "grilled" by Landsberg about the Bret Hart controversy.

“I got there and Vince [McMahon was getting grilled by Michael Landsberg. Michael Landsberg didn’t pull any punches. He grilled the sh** out of him. It was right after Bret [Hart] got scr**ed. I think in that interview, Michael Landsberg, he finally got Vince to admit he lied. ‘So you lied? So you lied?’ And Vince finally said, ‘Okay, yes. Okay? Okay pal? I lied.’” [1:22 - 1:51]

Landsberg added that he met Vince McMahon during the break and the reaction he got from the chairman when he imitated Shawn Michaels.

"He had this moment of ‘Ugh, I have to do another half hour of this?’ And Carl is like, ‘Vince McMahon, this is Jason Sensation, he does voices.’ And Vince was like, ‘He probably can’t do Shawn Michaels.’ [Jason imitates Shawn Michaels] ‘I’m the Heartbreak Kid, Shawn Michaels.’ You saw dollar signs in his eyes, I’ll never forget that time he looked at me, he never looked at me like that again.” [2:25 – 2:52]

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What happened during that Off The Record interview with Michael Landsberg and Vince McMahon?

While Sensation gave his own recollection of what McMahon said in the interview, he was correct in saying that this would be the first time that the chairman was forced to admit that he had lied to Bret Hart about the outcome of the match at Survivor Series 1997.

During the interview, Landsberg pressed McMahon into admitting that he had lied to Hart. He initially said that he had not lied to Hart, but he was contradicting himself when he had earlier said that Bret Hart had gone out thinking that the match would end in disqualification after hearing from "everyone who set it up," including McMahon.

After minutes of back and forth, Landsberg forced him into a position of having to admit it by saying, "So when he says you lied to him when he was heading to the ring..." McMahon paused and finally said, "He's right." He went on to add qualifications to this admission immediately after and justify his actions.

"He's [Bret Gart] right. I mean from that standpoint he's right, I couldn't take a risk, after asking him, after he breached his contract several times days before, denying what it was that we wanted. I couldn't take the risk that he was going to just walk out, and leave fans all over the world with nothing." [7:41 - 8:02]

This would be an immense moment as, at the time, there was still a lot of confusion about what had happened backstage during the Montreal Screwjob.

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How impactful do you think was Vince McMahon's confession was during the Off The Record show? Let us know in the comments section below.

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For any quotes taken from this article, please credit the Cafe de Rene podcast and provide H/T to Sportskeeda with a link.