Ryback wanted mixed-martial-arts to be a part of a feud with Brock Lesnar.
He said on Busted Open he wanted to face Lesnar at Wrestlemania for three years in a row. His pitch involved a six-month period of him being off of WWE television.
"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. 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,'" said Ryback.
He obviously never got his wish of the storyline, but Ryback says Vince McMahon’s response confused him.
"Vince, just completely, it went over his head and I just remember sitting there dumbfounded. Like, 'Jesus Christ! You can't fucking be that out of touch.' Maybe he didn't want me to go away for six months or whatnot. I don't know," said Ryback.
Instead of facing Lesnar, Ryback was on the pre-show twice and competed in a Battle Royale those three Wrestlemanias. He left WWE in August.
Recently, Ryback has made a few independent wrestling appearances. Transcript courtesy WrestlingINC.com.
