During his second tenure with the company, Roberts was pushed as a "Cinderella story" and faced Stone Cold Steve Austin in the final match of the 1996 King of the Ring tournament. Changes had to be made to the match's scripting as legitimate injuries sustained earlier in the evening in a match with Vader left Roberts unable to engage in the longer, more evenly matched bout originally intended between the men. In order to prevent Roberts from sustaining further injury, he was quickly defeated by Austin; in a post-match interview, Austin mocked his recital of the biblical passage by saying ""You sit there and you thump your Bible, and you say your prayers, and it didn't get you anywhere! Talk about your Psalms, talk about John 3:16... Austin 3:16 says I just whipped your ass!"". The catchphrase helped propel Austin to the top of the WWF, and is one of the moments that is often cited as the beginning of "The Attitude Era". Roberts next feuded with Jerry "The King" Lawler, who went to great lengths to ridicule Roberts' past alcoholism.