Ryback Reveals WrestleMania Angle He Proposed With Brock Lesnar, Vince McMahon's Reaction, CM Punk
Recently, former WWE Superstar Ryback was a guest on Busted Open. Among other things, Ryback talked about pitching an idea for a feud with Brock Lesnar to WWE Chairman Vince McMahon. Also, Ryback addressed the speculation that he has been in talks to fight for Bellator MMA. Finally, Ryback discussed CM Punk's losing effort in his UFC debut against Mickey Gall.
According to Ryback, he proposed an angle to McMahon that he thought would make him seem like a credible WrestleMania opponent for Lesnar to the audience. As the story goes, Ryback would appear to leave the company to compete in MMA, only to return to WWE with newly acquired MMA skills.
"My idea was, and I went to Vince, I've been asking for Brock Lesnar for WrestleMania for the last three years. But I told Vince, 'you have to build me up properly.' And I go, 'this pay-per-view, it will break all-time records if you build this match up properly.' And I asked him, I go, 'you need to let me go away for six months' and I go, 'I live in Las Vegas [Nevada]. MMA is hugely, insanely popular. It's pretty much the breeding ground here in Las Vegas of MMA.' I said, 'let me go join a fight camp, full-time, for six months. We will make it look like I'm about to go out and do a real fight. I come back to WWE though, challenge Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania.'"
Ryback continued, "Vince, just completely, it went over his head and I just remember sitting there dumbfounded. Like, 'Jesus Christ! You can't f–king be that out of touch.' Maybe he didn't want me to go away for six months or whatnot. I don't know."
On the subject of possibly fighting for Bellator, 'The Big Guy' said that he will not make a decision on fighting until the new year, as he has many other projects in the works now.
"Bellator has reached out to [Manager] Pat Buck. Yes. They've gone back and forth. They definitely want me to fight for them. Yes. It would probably be for in a year's period of time. I can't make an honest decision on that until, at least, January, where I know where I'm sitting with my nutrition company, my supplement company, and the website, and the book. And I just have my hands in too many jars right now, but I am training. I'm doing Muay Thai, boxing, and jiu jitsu right now for fun and that's my wrestling conditioning, essentially, to go back on the road."
Although Ryback has not decided whether to jump into MMA at this point, he did acknowledge that it would help him regain the momentum he lost at the tail-end of his WWE run.
"Absolutely, as a business man, I'm absolutely open to the idea of it. I just have to make sure it's the right fit." Ryback added, "that would be the easiest, quickest way to restore lost momentum, is to go out there and do it for real."
As for Punk's UFC debut, Ryback gave Punk a lot of credit for fighting, but he also suggested that Punk may have been in over his head and he was not set up for success by UFC matchmakers.
"I give Punk a lot of credit for the courage that he showed in going and doing that. But they made some key mistakes with him. And he's not a physical specimen where he's going to manhandle anybody. He needs to really, really, really have all of his cards lined up for that to go well and he bit off more than he can chew going up against Mickey Gall for his first fight. There's no turning back. He's going to the top. Do you know what I mean? As far as UFC, that's the elite right there. It's not like he had any amateur fights or anything like that."
Listen to Ryback's comments here. If you use any of the quotes from this article, please credit Busted Open with an H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.
Source: Busted Open