Triple H gets to pick the flavor of ice cream now.
Ariel Helwani sat down with Triple H for BT Sport ahead of WWE Clash At The Castle and the pair discussed Vince McMahon’s retirement signaling a changing of the guard. Helwani asked if Vince wrote a note like an outgoing President would, or if he did anything else to pass the baton, and Triple H shared some of the advice Vince gave him upon his departure.
“He did. Look, I think in some manner for both of us, it’s a tough situation for him. In some manner — it’s even hard for me to picture now that he’s not in the equation. And he’s not, in any way, shape or form, but it’s hard to think about that he’s not there. And I think in that moment, hard for him to think about somebody coming in and doing what he’s done for 50 years or whatever, successfully, better than anybody in the world. So yeah, there was definitely that moment of giving me advice, but I think also in some manner,” he explained, “most of that advice was centered around ‘this is what you’ve been sitting next to me learning how to do for 25 years’ or whatever that [time] is… ‘You got this.’ [He said] just be confident in your decision-making, listen to people, be open to ideas and collaborate with other people, things like that that were just wonderful advice.
“And the truth is he’s my father-in-law. He’s not involved in the day-to-day business, but if I had to say to him, ‘Man, I find this difficult to deal with,’ he would give me some overall advice of just ‘listen to people, work with the team, do these things.’ He’s just a wealth of knowledge and the thing is in our positions now — myself, Stephanie, Nick Khan, and there’s so many other people that are such an integral part of WWE — he built such an amazing team for all of us that you have such a support system around you,” Triple H noted, “I couldn’t imagine trying to do this if you were sort of by yourself having to do it. But having that support system, having that team around you, having it all be there, it’s such a wonderful team. It’s a lot of work, but it makes the work fun and easy.”
Helwani followed up by commenting on the speculation that Vince would still be involved in WWE business despite his retirement, and Triple H said that’s not the case. Triple H also said that in so many words, Vince told him to run things the way that he thought would be best for business.
“One of the things that he, I don’t want to say outright said, but he alluded to me, [Vince] said ‘You’re going to do things. You cannot think about how I would do things. You have to think about things you want to do and how you feel like it’s best for the product. I might not like it, but I understand why you’re going to do the things you’re going to do. You have to do what you feel is right.’ But it’s a tough thing to get to,” he explained. “No one works together for that period of time — everybody would go, ‘I would have done that slightly differently.’
“It doesn’t mean it’s right or wrong, we use the term in the business ‘chocolate and vanilla.’ I want chocolate, you want vanilla. One of us has to pick a flavor, he would always pick the flavor. Now it’s my turn to pick the flavor,” Triple H stated. “It’s all good, it’s all ice cream, but it’s my time to pick the flavor and I have to be confident in those decisions and I can’t look back and say, ‘well what would Vince want to have for a flavor?’ Because it just wouldn’t be authentic then.”
Read More: Triple H Recalls Having To Call An Audible After Kurt Angle Got A Concussion At SummerSlam
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