Stone Cold Steve Austin has discussed his time as part of a tag team with Brian Pillman as The Hollywood Blonds in the early nineties in WCW.
Austin was talking to Chris Jericho on the Talk Is Jericho podcast when the subject of The Hollywood Blonds came up. According to Austin, he wasn’t in the least bit excited at being put into a tag team.
Austin explained:
“Brian and I, when they first put us together, I don’t know how excited he was about it but I know I wasn’t excited about it at all. I’m looking forward to the Dark Side of Wrestling documentary on him to come out – I get a chance to speak on this a little bit.”
“Once we gelled as a tag team, we didn’t have to really communicate a whole lot. And it was a deal whether Brian went in first, or I went in first, or just tagging in and out, we knew exactly what the other guy was going to do. So, we were so much on the same page it was incredible for guys with two completely different mindsets and backgrounds initially.”
“But as a tag team, we were always on the same page, coming off the top rope, doing all the stuff that we did. A lot of people would say ‘hey man, the Hollywood Blonds, they were-‘ some of the greener people say ’they were one of the best tag teams of all time’. No, we weren’t, we weren’t even close. We were maybe in the top-30 or top 40. But had we been together for another two or three years, I have no doubt we would have been considered one of the best tag teams of all time cause we’d only scratched the surface.”
The Blonds only lasted ten months as a team as an injury to Pillman kept him out of action. Upon his return Austin betrayed him ending their alliance in WCW. Austin explained that he felt there were darker forces at work leading to the split of the team.
Steve Austin commented:
“[They broke us up] because we got over – I’m still searching for the answer today. I don’t sit here and dwell on it because I don’t live in the past. But they broke us up for no reason and they put us together for no reason because they didn’t know what to do with either one of us.”
“As an interim tag team all of a sudden, we go out there and we’re getting over. Dude, you know how hard it is to get over. You’ve got this investment of time and television time and effort and thinking of all this. I’m 100% in and I fell in love with tag team wrestling.”
“When I first got in the business, you always get in as a single, for the most part. When you’re part of a tag team there’s always this inherent risk that you’re carrying 50% of the load. If your partner gets hurt dude there you go, you’re on your own, so we’re in it together. So I never did like to depend on anybody else. So when Brian and I got over and all of a sudden they unceremoniously split us apart and made us work against each other. We had some killer matches in Jacksonville, Florida, and just lighting each other up.”
“[…] Why they broke us up is a mystery to this day because we were a commodity and we could have gone as high as they wanted to push us and that was just the mindset of WCW back then.”
The duo held the Unified NWA and WCW World Tag Team Championships once after defeating Shane Douglas and Ricky Steamboat. Austin and Pillman were reunited in the WWF when Pillman joined the company in 1996. After first rekindling their friendship Austin attacked Pillman after Pillman praised Austin’s hated rival Bret Hart. This feud led to the infamous ‘Pillman’s got a gun’ segment on Raw where Austin attacked Pillman in his home.
Steve Austin also talked in-depth about his rivalry with WWE Hall Of Famer Bret ‘Hitman’ Hart. Austin spoke about two matches in particular, their clash at Survivor Series 1996 and their submission match at WrestleMania 13.