Mick Foley looked back on his “I Quit” match with The Rock at Royal Rumble 1999, revealing on Insight with Chris Van Vliet that the infamous chair shots were far more painful than he expected. He explained that the plan was for five shots, but his handcuffed hands prevented him from absorbing the impact, leaving him stunned in the ring.
“Plan was yeah, for five. But I was still in the ring at five. I didn’t realize that your body has the ability to give with a chair shot… This isn’t an exact analogy, but once my hands were cuffed… I can see why. If you were hit in the head, it would be far more painful. So I literally could not believe how much that first chair shot hurt, more than any one I’d ever taken.”
The Original Finish
Foley also revealed the original ending to the match, which was changed on the fly, and how he was unaware his family was genuinely terrified at ringside. “And so instead of being halfway up the aisle on five, I was still in the ring… I did not know my children were crying. The original finish, which was supposed to be the camera sees my family crying, I see my family crying, and I quit… that was the original idea,” Foley said. “And my worry was that I’d spent their whole lives telling them that I was just playing and that dad couldn’t be hurt. I thought they’d come over to the kids, they’d be like, reading. I didn’t know they’d be crying… Kids are resilient. They came around and started talking after a couple of weeks.”
On ‘Marking Out’
Foley also spoke about his happier moments with The Rock during their Rock & Sock Connection run, which he loved because it was unscripted.
“I’d like to say it was his idea… part of the fun of being with Rock is that nobody gave us a script, we went out there as the Rock and Sock Connection. So even when I started playing off his catchphrases, it worked so well because it was live, whereas if I’d said, ‘Hey, how do you feel about this?’ Maybe it would have gotten shot down.”
This led Foley to define his use of the word “mark,” stating that he only uses it positively and believes calling fans “marks” is a “self-defeating” practice.
“I remember I was doing a signing… I had to remember I’m at a signing, because I was marking out so much for our own work. And by the way, I only use the word mark in a positive way towards myself. I think the idea of referring to your fans in negative terms is self-defeating. You’re talking about your fans, people who like what you do, and then you’re going to give them a name based on them liking what you do? What does that make you? I consider what I do to wrestling is an art form… and if you take pride in what you do, then you should not be criticizing the people who like it. So when I say marking out, I only do that in happy terms, and usually about myself.”
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article please credit Insight with Chris Van Vliet with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription. You can find the show on Chris Van Vliet’s YouTube channel and all major podcast platforms.
