The former WWE employee, Ryan Reeves a.k.a Ryback recently started his own podcast, ‘Conversation with the Big Guy’. While the first episode stated the situation that forced him to leave the company, the second one provides his remark regarding his World Championship venture in WWE.
In this latest episode, the former Intercontinental Champion mentioned that he always felt as an alternative for John Cena during his Championship feud with CM Punk. He also commented about the claim that he was unable to succeed as a main-event performer :
"That always kind of upset me too, when people say I failed in the main event. I thoroughly succeeded in the main event and I proved myself. I was not put in the main event though to be the man. I was booked into an unfortunate situation where I'm pulled, I'm put into Cena's spot, who Cena at the time was supposed to work Punk to put Punk over with all that. Put in that situation, where you take the undefeated streak and you put me in there. And also, at that point, I'd not had long matches and I could. I wrestled in developmental for years. That was never an issue.
“Punk was extremely talented and he's a hell of a wrestler. And despite what people might think, I do respect him for his wrestling ability and the things that he did in the WWE. But you take me and how I look and you're putting me in the ring with him after doing all that and now you're asking us to do a whole different style and the people were not conditioned to that. And it was also horrible booking from that point on in my career. I think I lost the next seven pay-per-view matches or the next six. And during that time, I was the number two merchandise seller in the WWE, which a lot of people don't know about."
Although their motto should be to improve every superstar on the roster, the Big Guy stated that WWE mainly focuses on the development of a few chosen characters :
"The WWE's mission and goal should be, from top to bottom, from the lowest Superstar on the totem pole to the highest Superstar on the totem pole, is to go out there and make sure that each individual Superstar's brand is as strong as possible. They should be invested from the lowest guy to the top guy. Everybody is f--king important in that company and it's not fair.
“And you have your guys who are making your money because that is the way you're portraying it and I get that, but everybody is important and for a guy to be limited and told no he can't have outside opportunities, that only hurts your own brand from a company standpoint. The stronger your individual brands are, the stronger your company is. And I don't think they understand that or they do and they just don't care and it's frustrating. And I'm not the only guy."
Towards the end of the podcast, Ryback clarified that he will continue to wrestle only to define himself as “the number one big guy” in this industry. As the wrestler now enjoys full control over his career, he is determined to prove all his doubters wrong.
