A former WWE star has recalled their rivalry with The Rock and how they specifically wanted a steel chair to hit them in the face.

With fans and wrestlers more educated on head injuries, unprotected chair shots to the head have been outlawed in major wrestling promotions aside from exceptional circumstances, which also have precautions in place. However, during previous eras, strikes with the chair were commonplace and hard to watch in the present day.

During an episode of Raw in 1998, the Hollywood star blasted Ken Shamrock across the face with one of the most brutal chair shots in the history of the flagship show. According to The World’s Most Dangerous Man, this was under his own orders.

Speaking with Chris Van Vliet, Shamrock recalled his memories of the chair shot from The Rock and how he instructed the Hollywood star to aim right for his face as he would not take the shot on the back or the top of his head:

“A lot of people think it’s crazy but I enjoyed the chair shot. Everybody keeps looking at that, and they say it over and, oh, man, that must have hurt. For me, it’s funny, because it would hurt so much more if I didn’t see it coming. Top of the head, back of the head. I wanted it.

I was like, bro, you were not hitting me in the head, like the top of the head or back of the head. I want you to hit me right in the face. He’s like, shut up. He thought I was kidding. I was like, bro, come on, man. I’m not taking it to the back of the head or top of the head.

I say, if you’re gonna swing, you swing for my face and I’ll take care of the rest. I mean, I literally said that, swing for my face and I will protect myself. He looked at me with this bewildered [expression] like, where’s the punchline? Where’s the joke here? And I looked and I said, No, I’m serious. And he’s like, I’m not doing that. And I said [then] I’m not taking it. I said swing for my face. I’ll protect myself. And he goes, You sure? And I was like, Yeah. And I remember, look right at him in the eyes, and I go, you better swing it. And he says, Oh, I’ll swing it!”

When asked how he protected himself from the shot, Shamrock stated that his previous fighting experience helped:

“Well, he swung for my face like I asked him to. I told him it’s not his responsibility, it’s mine. You swing it and I’ll do the rest. And so he did, and all I did was just like I would in a fight. I tucked my chin and it hit me right in the forehead. Anybody knows how the skull is put together, the thickest part is your forehead. Just like within football, and now they can’t do it, but you usually hit with the forehead. And if you get punched, most of the time, if you hit somebody in the forehead, you break your hand.

So I just logically thought if I was going to get hit in the head, hit me in the hardest part [laughs]. That was a great moment, though, because I had no idea what it would look like, or what the impact of that would be. It was just basically a thought in my head, because I saw everybody else doing it, and I was like, Man, that is just a dumb way to take a chair hit in the top of the head, back of the head, and I ain’t doing that. Hit me in the forehead.”

Shamrock also added that the only thing that bothered him about the segment was the sound and it sounded like a gun went off when the chair landed.

Also in the interview, Ken Shamrock explained why he turned down the offer of being in the Brawl for All tournament.

Although few predicted that The Rock would become one of the biggest stars in the history of the business in 1996, his heel turn began the shift in momentum to super stardom. Aware that his stock was on the rise, The Great One looked to secure a new WWE contract. During a recent interview, The Rock looked back on one of his early negotiations and how he had requested to be paid double what Steve Austin was making.

Also in the interview, the Attitude Era star spoke about his omission from the WWE Hall of Fame.