Jim Cornette has carved out a distinct niche for himself in the wrestling business as one of its toughest critics. While he has made appearances on the recent season of Dark Side of the Ring, Cornette's focus is back on his podcast, the Jim Cornette Experience, where he dishes out a lot of takes on wrestling. Some are booking ideas that help to remind fans that he was once a vital creative presence in companies from WWE to his own promotion, Smoky Mountain Wrestling.
What his podcast is most known for, however, are Cornette's scathing rants at modern promotions and talent that offend his old-school sensibilities -- these days, it seems like that's most of them. Most of the time his takes, as vitriolic as they are, can be chalked up to a combination of personal taste and his being an "old man yells at cloud"-style curmudgeon. His take on Becky Lynch's pregnancy, however, saw Cornette go old school in a way far beyond that.
Cornette couldn't fathom how Lynch and Rollins would choose to start a family in this point in their careers when Lynch was arguably WWE's top full-time star. Most of Cornette's incredulity stemmed from his frame of reference coming up in the territories. He compared Lynch choosing to have a baby and going on maternity leave to "one of the boys breaking his leg on purpose" to get out of working. He repeatedly fixated on the idea of Lynch passing up a million dollars to have a baby, as if she were the Joker lighting a tower of money on fire and not someone WWE would still want to use for PR purposes. (Cornette admitted in a follow-up segment that he wasn't thinking about WWE's guaranteed contracts when he made his first comments.)
While that might be wrongheaded, what really caused the controversy -- or at least exacerbated it -- were his remarks about what he believed Rollins would have to look forward to when he came home to a pregnant, non-revenue generating Lynch. Comparing the 33-year-old Lynch's ability to have a baby to an "Easy Bake Oven" that wouldn't shut off for years, Cornette said "she can have all those problems like a distended stomach and stretch marks and hemorrhoids and hormones problems and mood swings and all those other joys of motherhood later on when she ain't making a million dollars a year!"
He finished by putting his listeners in Rollins' shoes, asking, "What would you do if your wife came home and said, instead of making a million dollars next year I’m gonna basically just be a raging bitch for the next nine months and then give you more shit to worry about around the house?!"
Rollins responded to Cornette's comments on Corey Graves' podcast, After the Bell. He said the statements hurt "on a personal level" because Cornette "is someone who is a legend in our industry, he is someone that I’ve personally worked with in my time at Ring of Honor, and for him to come out and say some real negative things, some real misogynistic things about women in general and pregnancy in the industry, it kind of caught me off-guard."
Rollins might have missed Cornette calling Impact Wrestling's Jordynne Grace a "butterface" because she had the temerity to say wrestling was a performance art, or his recent comments about Dana Brooke. It can be difficult to keep up with all of Cornette's problematic takes, especially if your schedule is as busy as Rollins' is.
Rollins went on to say the comments caused him to "lose a lot respect for someone that people have already lost respect for." He was hoping his connection with Cornette might make him think twice about making the comments he did, about women in general, and his wife in particular, and that he wouldn't be able to forgive Cornette for them.
The personal connection is an interesting wrinkle to the story. Rollins is one of the few active wrestlers whom Cornette does not actively root against. In fact, Cornette paid him the compliment of comparing him to the legendary Rick Rude, leading to pleasantries between the two being exchanged on Twitter.
Cornette also played a serious hand in Rollins' career when he left Ring of Honor. Cornette told the story of how he talked Rollins out of signing with TNA. Rollins confirmed that when he appeared on Edge and Christian's podcast.
Rollins was considering taking an offer with what was then the No. 2 promotion in the United States due to lack of interest from WWE, but Cornette found TNA's offer insulting. He advised Rollins to ask some questions before signing with the company. Cornette reasoned that if TNA wanted him now, they'd still want him in the week it would take to clear some things up.
In the time it took TNA to get back to Rollins, WWE finally made him an offer to join their developmental territory, FCW. Cornette considers keeping Rollins from signing with TNA one of his biggest accomplishments in recent years, given that it kept him from potentially suffering the same treatment as wrestlers like NJPW's Kazuchika Okada (or two of Cornette's many nemeses, the Young Bucks).
It's unfortunate to see Cornette, not too far removed from his latest exit from a promotion, alienate someone like Rollins. His history with Rollins and his contributions to Dark Side of the Ring show him to be more than the crotchety gatekeeper his detractors cast him as. He has contributed positively to the business he obviously loves so much, even in this century.
That said, "drawing heat" is a way of life for an old heel manager. Whether he genuinely believes every inflammatory thing he says or tweets or is just "working the marks" is irrelevant to anyone who's put him on their "pay no mind" list. He still has his fans and will likely never stop being a lightning rod for controversy, but whether it's fans of Ricky Morton or Becky Lynch, he's always going to antagonize someone.