The WWE Hall of Fame Ceremony, and the road leading up to it, often excites wrestling fans because it officially recognizes some of the company’s most legendary stars. This year, Kane, The Great Khali and Molly Holly are just a few of the examples of the performers who will be inducted.
But many fans frequently wonder how WWE determines each Hall of Fame class. In a recent appearance on Pardon My Take, Triple H explained that WWE doesn’t exactly follow the voting process that’s used by other sports. But he stated that plenty of people offer their input on each year’s group of inductees.
“So there’s a lot of people that put a suggestion on it, from within the company, so writing teams, you have people in television production, so across the board, there’s a lot of people that have input into it,” said Triple H. “And then it gets whittled down by different departments until we get to a base of more people than we need, and then Vince makes the final call on where it’s gonna go from there.
Triple H also described how Vince McMahon views the ceremony as a show that’s meant to entertain the fans, and this perspective also shapes the class that gets recognized each year.
“Vince looks at [the] Hall of Fame as, or WWE looks at Hall of Fame as, a moment of entertainment as well,” said Triple H. “So it’s not just about who’s going to go in in that moment, it’s part of a show.. And what he believes in as part of that is, somebody like Kane is get an opportunity to go on a stage. This year will be different because of the way it is, but in years’ past, you’re gonna get an opportunity to go and relive your career one more time in a show, and sort of be a part of that and have an entertainment value to that.
“And you kinda want to make that a show across the board, not just be some stodgy show that’s, you’re an hour and 45 minutes into watching and you regret watching because everybody’s been saying the same thing and it’s boring. You want it to have kind of ups and downs and be entertainment. He really believes in that, so that’s a lot of what goes into it.”
“The Game” then explained that Vince McMahon tries to structure the classes to avoid grouping too many “dry” inductees together in order to make the show as entertaining as possible.
“The sort of, ‘Who deserves to be in?’ is talked about a lot, from everybody else, and then he kind of takes that list of who deserves, and then kind of goes through it and figures out how the entertainment component of it can work,” said Triple H. “And [he’ll] say like this guy’s gonna be really dry, this guy will be dry, too. Let’s wait and put this dry guy in next year because we’re gonna put this dry guy in already this year,’ so balance it out.”
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