Bruce Prichard On Why The Dream Match Between Shawn Michaels & Rob Van Dam Didn't Work

The main event of the November 25, 2002 episode of Raw was a dream match between Shawn Michaels and Rob Van Dam.

The Heartbreak Kid defended the World Heavyweight Championship against The Whole F'N Show in just his third match back since returning at that year's SummerSlam. Michaels was retired for four years after undergoing back fusion surgery, but won the title eight days prior to his meeting with Van Dam in the inaugural Elimination Chamber Match at Survivor Series.

The bout between HBK and RVD ended in a disqualification when Triple H ran in.

Speaking about the match on a recent edition of his Something to Wrestle With podcast, Bruce Prichard outlined why he believes the match didn't properly click, despite high expectations:

"I think it was a styles clash. It was a clash of styles that I didn't think would work. I really didn't. Rob needs a certain kind of opponent. Shawn could work a broomstick. Rob definitely wasn't a broomstick. Rob was heavy, he was thick. It was ugly. It got hit by an ugly stick. It was two guys who didn't mesh. They were not meshing for several minutes...It didn't gel".

WWE never booked a rematch. Asked whether it was true that Michaels and Triple H weren't fans of Rob's ring work, Prichard said:

"No. They actually were both big fans of Rob. They were two proponents of getting Rob into the mix. Hence the reason we even did the match. A lot of the lustre came off when Rob came off the top onto Hunter's throat. It wasn't clumsy, it was just an accident. I think a lot of people looked at that and thought Rob was dangerous. That was a reputation that Van Dam had. That he was dangerous. I didn't think Rob was dangerous, I thought he was snug. I don't think anything Rob ever did was dangerous to his opponents. In hurting Hunter it was 'Oh God, he's dangerous'".

H/T 411mania.com