WWE legend Stone Cold Steve Austin clarifies his past comments about not believing in CTE.
WWE Hall of Famer Stone Cold Steve Austin appeared on Busted Open Radio, celebrating the iconic Austin 3:16 Day. During the conversation, he looked back at his comments about Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) in the 2024 Netflix docuseries, Mr. McMahon.
CTE became a talking point in Steve Austin’s interview in the documentary as they discussed the 2007 Chris Benoit tragedy. He said, “My take on that has always been if you’re just wrestling and you got a bunch of concussions, you’re probably doing something wrong. I’m not a CTE guy. I just don’t believe in it.”
Steve Austin clarified his comments
Clarifying his comments, Steve Austin said that he does believe in CTE, but in proper, smart old-school wrestling, concussions shouldn’t happen much, and that it doesn’t apply the same way to wrestling as it does to other sports like football.
“Well, I remember they were doing a documentary one time and they were talking about CTE at the time, and this was, Jesus, 15, 20 years ago. I think we just had this conversation on the telephone a long time ago. 20 years ago, and I said that, ‘Hey man, I don’t think if you work in the business of pro wrestling, you shouldn’t have a whole lot of concussions and maybe you’re doing it wrong,’ Steve Austin said.
“And I was speaking from a classical, Ric Flair-type style of wrestling that you shouldn’t be having a bunch of things and man, all of a sudden — I’m not really answering your question but, I just remember my Twitter timeline started blowing up and the people got mad as hell at me and they said, ‘Oh! You don’t believe in CTE?’ I was like, ‘God dang.’ I said, ‘No, I believe in CTE. Just not as it really kind of applies technically to pro wrestling,’” Steve Austin said.
“It’s gonna be a hot button that everybody starts sounding off so, I’ll get out of it but, that was just kind of being put on the spot about it and I answered accordingly so, sh*t, I don’t know… I’m not a scientist, I’m not a doctor… I took a lot of bumps and took some shots but, do I forget things every now and then? Yeah, well, I’m 61. I think that kind comes with the territory,” Steve Austin laughed. “But, I’ve seen most of the guys that I know are pretty cool.” [H/T Fightful]
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