Steve Austin clarifies his thoughts on CTE in pro wrestling

As far as Steve Austin is concerned, the best way to deal with CTE in wrestling is to avoid getting concussions in the first place. 

The subject came up as Austin was talking to Dave LaGreca and Bully Ray on the Busted Open Podcast. Ray asked Austin about WWE Unreal, a show Austin has said he’s a fan of, and asked how Austin would deal with having cameras put in front of him backstage. 

“I remember they were doing that documentary one time, and they were talking about CTE at the time, and this was, Jesus, 15, 20 years ago,” Austin said. “I think you and me had this conversation on a telephone a long time ago … and I said that ‘Hey man, I don’t think, if you work in the business of pro wrestling, you should have a whole lot of concussions, and maybe you’re doing it wrong.” 

“I was thinking from like a classical Ric Flair-type style of wrestling, that you shouldn’t be having a bunch of things,” Austin continued. “And man all of a sudden … I just remember my Twitter timeline started blowing up and people got mad as hell at me and say ‘Oh, you don’t believe in CTE?’ And I was like, god dang. I said, ‘No, I believe in CTE, just not as it really kind of applies technically to pro wrestling.’”

“Yeah, is CTE a real thing? Yeah, it is.”