By Bruce Mitchell, PWTorch senior columnist

Amidst all the hoopla of Donald Trump buying Monday Night Raw from Mr. McMahon this week, viewers might have lost sight of an unfortunate fact.

WWE lost its nerve. I don’t know whether an advertiser complained, or for once WWE listened to the caterwauling of a few critics, or some little wrestler objected, but when Raw recapped Edge telling Vickie Guerrero once and for all what’s what, they cut the guts out of the segment.

That’s despite the fact that fans were clearly enjoying seeing then–Raw General Manager Vickie Guerrero, one of the biggest heels in the business, finally get her comeuppance.

That happened without those fans knowing that Guerrero had the nerve, only weeks after Vince McMahon had given her the highly sought after Raw G.M. position, to give notice, leaving McMahon and the entire WWE Universe in the lurch. She said she had to go home to take care of her family.

Vince McMahon has a family, too, you know. Did Vickie Guerrero think about that for one minute when she made her selfish, ungrateful decision to take her Miss WrestleMania tiara and go home?

McMahon had to act, and more than that, he had to send a strong, clear message to both his locker room and stockholders that this kind of ingratitude would not be tolerated. As soon as Guerrero gave notice, McMahon sent Santino Morella out on national television to call her a pig and squeal piggishly in her presence. Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler, the Raw announcers, underlined the message with their own squeals of laughter at Morella’s mocking.

This, of course, immediately turned Morella, a transvestite, into the fans’ hero.

Was the labeling of Guerrero as a fat pig, coupled with tossing a bucket of pig shit on her, and having her on–air husband dump her because she had quit being General Manager and no longer was of use to him, sneering that he never had sex with her because she was fat, harsh?

No.

Vickie Guerrero shouldn’t even be on Vince McMahon’s television shows. She wouldn’t be, if it was not for her husband Eddie Guerrero (her real one) dying just before he was to main event a WWE show, leaving WWE in the lurch much like Vickie did by giving notice out of nowhere before months of Monday Night Raws.

Eddie Guerrero, who McMahon hired and made a world champion, despite the obvious fact he was too small to be a WWE Superstar, caused McMahon and WWE a lot of trouble by dying. His death ignited a firestorm of bad publicity in the media, costing McMahon and his company millions of dollars in potential advertising and lucrative business deals. More important to McMahon than money, however, the ill–informed publicity cost him a part of his reputation he has never gotten back.

McMahon was forced to institute a Health and Wellness Policy for the talent because, as he patiently explained to congressional investigators, that would help counteract this bad publicity. This expensive, time–consuming procedure, that would not even had to have been instituted were it not for Vickie’s husband, has caused countless headaches and embarrassments for McMahon and his staff.  

The lifeblood of his business, the WWE Superstars, have seen their careers interrupted and even terminated, with competing promotions often benefiting, due to this confusing policy. Even worse, this policy has caused McMahon, by all accounts the hardest working man in the industry, and his staff extra work and deflected energy and attention away from their creative effort, by extension making things worse for the WWE fans.

Without question, Eddie Guerrero’s death, and the subsequent Health and Wellness Policy, put more pressure on Chris Benoit.

Vince McMahon, though, had the compassion to look beyond how Eddie Guerrero’s death inconvenienced him and his company, and reached out to his widow Vickie Guerrero. This, even after at the funeral a WWE Hall of Famer unfairly and inappropriately suggested McMahon step in and give the widow Guerrero the money she needed to keep the family house.

Why was that McMahon’s responsibility? He didn’t have anything to do with her husband’s death.

After Guerrero lost her house, McMahon helped her. He knew that work is a great antidote for grief. (It’s a lesson he learned the hard way after burying so many of his independent contractors.)

McMahon gave Vickie Guerrero that most valuable thing of all in the WWE Universe—opportunity. She gained the opportunity to leave the drudgeries of raising three children to become famous, travel the world, and make money as a WWE Superstar. His creative team used all of its talents to transform Vickie Guerrero, a non–performer, into one of the most over acts on WWE television. (Compare Raw General Manager Vickie Guerrero’s one–dimensional screeching with ECW General Manager Tiffany’s ability to carry multiple segments in a given hour.) They even booked some romance in her life, helping her get beyond the Guerrero Family shadow by pairing her with Edge, one of the top Superstars in the company.   

How did Vickie Guerrero thank Vince McMahon and his company for all he did for her and her family?

The minute Vickie Guerrero, like a greedy pig, finished gobbling up all the fame and money she needed from the WWE trough, she gave notice, once again leaving McMahon and his company to clean up a Guerrero mess.

Don’t give me that “Calling Vickie Guerrero a fat pig is harsh” stuff, either. Vickie Guerrero was fat, compared to not only the WWE Divas, but every other woman on WWE television—the only standard. WWE has been consistent in not upsetting the WWE Universe with images of women who do not fit their ideal. Guerrero was the charitable exception, until she turned her back on her WWE family.

Vince McMahon has been nothing if not consistent with this policy. When his daughter Stephanie McMahon came back from having his grandchild having gained some weight and couldn’t meet this standard, cameramen at first filmed her only above the waist, then she got kicked in the head and kicked off TV altogether.

If, for the good of the business, Vince McMahon can treat his favorite child and heir to pro wrestling’s throne like that, why should he go out of his way to be kind to a fat pig who turned her back on WWE after all he did for her and her family?    

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