Vince McMahon has always had a love-hate relationship with legendary commentator Jim Ross.
Despite Ross being the ‘voice’ of the Attitude Era and being a fan favorite broadcaster, it always seemed that McIntyre wasn’t so happy with his work. He would constantly yell in Ross’ ears. One time, he publicly embarrassed him with the Dr. Heiney skit on television, and even fired him multiple times from the company.
Former WWE commentator, Todd Grisham, recently discussed Vince McMahon in an interview with Chris Van Vliet. Grisham shared a story about Vince wanting to antagonize Jim Ross in front of his hometown just because he didn’t like him.
Todd Grisham Says Vince McMahon ‘Hated’ Jim Ross
On Chris Van Vliet’s podcast, Grisham recalled that one time WWE was doing a show in Oklahoma. They had brought Todd to replace Jim Ross in the company, but those plans eventually fell through.
After the show in Oklahoma, Jim Ross addressed the crowd, and that’s when Vince sent Todd to the ring with a microphone to say some demeaning things. Ross knew these weren’t the words of Grisham, but Vince’s. Ultimately, Jim Ross didn’t end up retiring that time. He continued working for WWE until 2013, before leaving for a few years.
Fans can read the whole story in Todd’s words below:
“So eventually they said, ‘All right, here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to give you the keys to Raw. You’re going to be the face. You’re going to call Raw. JR, we’re retiring him.’ He had a retirement tour, or something similar to that, where he was going to retire after WrestleMania. He’s going to call the WrestleMania match, and that was it. But the receptions he was getting in all these buildings, and eventually they’re like, we can’t take him off the air. He’s too big. Even though Vince tried to squash it. Vince hated Jim Ross for whatever reason. He fired him ten times.
“One show, I don’t remember where it was. It was in Oklahoma, in front of his home crowd. So the show ended, and they were gonna have Jim Ross speak to the crowd. Thank you very much. Blah, blah, blah. So Jim Ross is in the ring, and Vince tells me, grab a mic and go down there, and he gave me some questions. I go down there. ‘Sorry to interrupt you, JR, in front of the crowd, but how does it feel to be getting released by WWE and fired by Vince because he just doesn’t think you’re that good…’ and all these antagonizing things.
“The number one rule, you probably know this when you’re an interviewer, is to never give up the mic. Boxing, UFC, they take the mic. You’re out of control. So you sit there no matter what. But at that point, Jim Ross looked at me and goes, ‘Could I please have the microphone?’ And I’m thinking, Vince is gonna kill me if I give him the mic. But I was like, I just handed him the mic. I was like, I’m not gonna do it, and I’ll take the abuse. And JR went and said, ‘I know those weren’t your questions. Those were his.’
And so anyway, long story short, they don’t fire JR. Maybe that’s when they put me on ECW. I don’t remember, but we’re gonna give you this show. Well, you’re the guy in waiting until Jim Ross is done.”
Jim Ross currently works for All Elite Wrestling as a color commentator.
Ishaan Sharma has been following wrestling ever since he was 8. That was over a decade ago. He loves to write about this pretend sport and has worked with online publications such as Sportskeeda and TheSportster, where he shared his insights about the wrestling business.