by Dave Batista
It wasn’t for lack of trying. I didn’t know how to make myself better.
I did cardio, tried to drop some weight, even struggled with my asthma. I got into much better shape. But I didn’t learn a whole lot of wrestling down there. I learned moves, but even when I left there, I wasn’t very good by any means. And I wasn’t ready for the spotlight, not by a long shot.
TALKING
One of the problems I had at OVW had nothing to do with wrestling. I’m kind of a quiet guy by nature. Doing interviews wasn’t very easy at all. As a matter of fact, later on when I would be interviewed on radio or for some news story or something, a lot of times I would bring my wife. The interviewer would ask the question and I’d have maybe a word or two for them, and that would be it. But my wife could give them a lot more.
Some of my family’s friends were kind of surprised when they heard that I was going into wrestling. They wished me well and everything, but they were wondering how I would do when it came to television. They thought I would just be too shy to go on-screen. But I can be the Animal when I’m in character. The Animal may not say much, but he’s not shy about being in the ring, or about himself. That was one of the things that I started to learn at OVW, and later at WWE: how to become the character I was playing on television.
I think on a lot of interviews since I’ve become famous, just because of the questions I’ve been asked, I’ve focused in on a lot of the negatives of Ohio, what I didn’t learn, what I failed to figure out. I never really got to speak out about what I did learn. So let me take the time now to focus on a few other things that I did pick up there, and that I am grateful for having been taught.
One thing that I always loved about Jim Cornette is the fact that he’s a huge buff of the history of wrestling. He would make us study. We read Lou Thesz’s book, Hooker: An Authentic Wrestler’s Adventures Inside the Bizarre World of Professional Wrestling, to get a feel for the industry, especially as it was during the eighties and early nineties. He gave us another book whose title I don’t recall, but which had a lot of information on older wrestlers, guys who had passed away. And we watched shoot interviews with Cowboy Bill Watts. Watts was an old-school wrestler and then wrestling promoter who had a tremendous store of information and stories about wrestling. By “shoot” I mean that his interviews weren’t in character; he was telling the viewers a lot about the inner workings of the business.
Jim Cornette really tried to school us on the traditions of sports entertainment. He was really big on making sure we knew our history. I always loved that about Cornette. Danny Davis was the trainer when we were down there. I always liked him, though he always seemed stressed when I was around. He was good to me, though. So was Nick Dinsmore—probably better known to fans as Eugene—who was teaching classes at the time.
I learned a lot at OVW about the responsibilities that come with being a wrestler. Some are pretty simple, like just being on time and doing your job. Simple, but important.
There’s a lot more to being a wrestler than just being out there in the ring. I really learned how to be responsible. I really grew up a lot as a person at OVW. Before then, all my jobs were at places where I could more or less do what I wanted. Everybody I worked with or for was always my friend. I could come and go as I pleased.
Jim Cornette.
At OVW, there was more responsibility on my shoulders. I don’t want to say it was a huge burden, but there were things I had to do, and I had to do them right. My part in the ring, showing up at appearances, taking time for the fans–these things and more were all part of my responsibilities as a wrestler. I realized this was my one and only shot, and I didn’t want to freakin’ blow it.
AN ALL-STAR CAST
We had an all-star cast down there. A lot of the guys who were in there around the time that I was moved up and became huge stars. I’m talking about guys like Shelton Benjamin, Randy Orton, Brock Lesnar, Rico Constantino, and John Cena. They were all wrestling at OVW during that time period.
Shelton and I were never superclose, but he’s one of those guys I’ve always liked from day one. He’s probably one of the most easygoing guys I’ve ever met in my life. I don’t want to say he’s floating through life, but he does seem to just blow in the wind. He’s a naturally gifted athlete. It’s freaky some of the things he can do.
And every once in a while, he’ll just break out into an impersonation of someone and it’ll be the funniest freakin’ thing. Just crack you up. On the microphone, though, he’s so dry. I don’t know why that happens.
I’d met Brock up in Minneapolis before either of us was in the business; we’d both trained together in the gym. He was still wrestling for the University of Minnesota, where he won the NCAA championship in 2000 as a heavyweight. Brock is one of the strongest guys I’ve ever met in my life. He’s just a freak of nature—strong and fast and agile. He’s unbelievable. His parents are like normal people, but he’s just an incredible freak of nature. It’s as if a meteorite brought him to earth.
I was disappointed when Brock left WWE. Besides having good technique and wrestling skills, Brock was awesome at psychology, at doing the things you have to do to sell a match. It was too bad—I always thought that if he and I had gotten together, we would have given the fans a great show. It would have been magic, a real battle of the giants.
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Randy Orton and me during our OVW days.
Rico—Americco Tomhas Constantino—is an interesting guy. It would take me hours to get you to understand the way Rico is. He’s probably one of the most entertaining guys I’ve ever met. Toward the end of his career, he took a little bit of a surly turn, but back in OVW he was a big cheerleader, real positive and very happy. He was one of the guys who was so proud of being a wrestler. Every so often you’d catch him wearing his OVW belts out in public. He was just so proud of what he did. He’s a good guy, one of those people you can trust, which is rare in this business. He and I rode together for a while. He was always wired at the end of the night, so he would do the driving. I will always consider Rico a close friend and someone I can trust.
CENA
Cena is huge now. He just starred in the movie The Marine, so he’s known to audiences that don’t even follow wrestling. He’s a WWE Champion and is one of Raw’s biggest stars.
Now back when he was at OVW, he was the whitest white kid I had ever met. Somehow he turned himself into a streetwise, thuggish kid. I don’t know where that came from. But it worked.
John’s impressive on so many levels, it’s ridiculous. He’s probably one of the smartest guys I ever met. He’s got a freaky memory. And he can rap freestyle like crazy. It’s just incredible. If you gave him a word, gave him a subject, he could just go rhyming on it, rapping off the top of his head, forever. It’s amazing. I’ve listened to him rap for ten, twenty minutes. Just freestyle rapping about a sign he saw, the trees, whatever. It was pretty entertaining, just amazing.
At first, it didn’t have anything to do with his wrestling. It was just a talent he had. Then I think Shane McMahon got wind of it and asked him to do it. From there I think they worked it into his character for him.
Physically, of course, Cena’s a specimen. He’s a damn freak. He was like that, even down at OVW. He’s always been superimpressive.
A STRUGGLE FOR MY WIFE
We didn’t really travel in OVW. We’d go do shows in high schools and other spots an hour or an hour and a half away from Louisville, but it wasn’t a real taste of life on the road. We always slept in our own beds every night. Which was definitely a good thing for me, family-wise.
I think my wife, Angie, was starting to struggle a little bit with me being in wrestling. From the first day we got together, she was crazy insecure. I don’t think there was a time in our marriage when she didn’t think that I was cheating on her. The circumstances that we started under probably had something to do with that. But at least at OVW I was able to come home every night, and we spent a lot of time together.
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Photo 18
Celebrating Keilani’s birthday.
For me, I was having a hard time being away from my kids. I was trying to keep in touch with them, mostly through the phone. Their mom worked for United Airlines at the time, and she had them fly out to see me when she could. I always appreciated that.
Financially, we still struggled a little bit, because I wasn’t making much money. But the truth is, things were pretty good. I was home every night, in love with my wife, and she was in love with me. We were together.
I thought it was hard at the time, ’cause it seemed like it was hard going to wrestle every day, then trying to work out, doing a few shows a week. But God, what I would give now to have those easy days back.
BUSTED
The WWE would call us up every once in a while to do dark matches for one of their shows. A dark match is a wrestling contest that is held before the television show itself begins; the fans in the arena see it, but it never goes on the air. Those dark shows gave WWE a chance to see how we were coming along and to judge the audience reaction to us, that sort of thing.
We did this one match in Chicago, I think, where I tagged with Mr. Perfect against Shelton Benjamin and I think Randy Orton. We couldn’t find Mr. Perfect before the match. I was a nervous wreck. He showed up literally as we were ready to walk out.
Like I said, I was an emotional wreck. I’m saying, “What are we doing? What are we going to do out there? What are we doing?”
I was used to having everything told to me: do this, this, this, and this. But Mr. Perfect—Curt Hennig—was from the old school.
“Ah, we’ll just call it out there,” he said, meaning that once we were in the ring, we’d decide the moves that would be made.
I just about freaked out. But of course that was the way we had to do it.
So we were in the ring. I was with Shelton Benjamin and I had no clue what the hell I was doing. But I had to make the call. So I had Shelton give me something really stupid, like an elbow. Which I bumped for, going down on my back. He covered me. So I’m down on the mat, he’s covering me, and I’m trying to come up with something to tell him what we’re going to do when we get up.
Before I could think of anything, I got counted out.
He beat me because of an elbow?
Oh, fuck.
Fuck!
I was freaking out. Mr. Perfect’s freaking out. The fans were freaking out. They started booing. And booing. I actually think we did a restart. It didn’t matter. I just wanted to die right there.
After the match, I got my stuff, I found my wife.
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My first magazine article.
“We gotta get outta here,” I told her. “Let’s go.”
I felt so embarrassed. I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I just wanted to leave.
But that would have been too easy.
Angie had been there for a while and was a little tipsy.
Drunk may be a better word.
“How many beers did you have?” I asked her.
“Two?”
“You got six cups in your hand.”
“Oh, I’m busted.”
My wife had been in the audience drinking beer, having a good ol’ time, while I was making an ass of myself in the ring. That wouldn’t have been bad at all, except that when we went out to try and find our car, she couldn’t remember where she parked it. We couldn’t find it. We must have spent like two hours looking for my car.
It’s a funny story now, but that night I wasn’t laughing.
HURRICANE
Hurricane—Gregory Helms—became a real good friend of mine later on. But the first night I met him, I had had such a fucking awful match. You know it’s bad when you go up to gorilla—the ready-room area during a wrestling show, named after famous wrestling commentator and wrestler Gorilla Monsoon—and no one will look at you, not make eye contact or anything. Well, it was one of those nights. I felt so bad and I was sitting down and pouting, just about heartbroken and maybe ready to cry because my match was so bad.
Hurricane walked over to me and he didn’t know me from anything, but he was looking out for me. He said, “Man, don’t let these guys see you like that. Pick up, put a fake-ass smile on your face, and don’t let these guys see you down.”
I’ll never forget that. He went out of his way to help me out. He’s my boy. Even though he is an abrasive dickhead.
There were other times when I was just so embarrassed I left without talking to anyone, not even saying good-bye. I’d get my stuff, grab Angie, stalk back to the car, and get out of there.
DEACON BATISTA
I was at OVW for two years as Leviathan, from 2000 to 2002. I had a shaved head, a big chain around my neck, and black trunks. Whatever was or wasn’t happening for me at WWE in those dark shows, I was doing pretty well at OVW. I had the look, and after a while, I became a really big deal there. I won the OVW Heavyweight Championship from Doug Basham, who was wrestling as the Machine.
I was ready to move up, or so I thought. I kept hoping the call would come.
Brock Lesnar had been at OVW around that time. Among other things, he and Shelton Benjamin were the OVW Southern Tag Team champs. Brock had been a star college wrestler before turning pro, he had a real good look, and WWE had very high hopes for him. He was called up and went on Raw, I believe in March 2002. Right away, they brought him out as a star.
I thought they’d do the same for me.
Heh.
It was Johnny Ace who finally called me and said they wanted me on SmackDown! Johnny Ace’s real name is John Laurinaitis; he’s head of talent at WWE.
“We’re starting you on TV next week,” he told me. “So we need you to go out and buy a really nice suit.”
He gave me all the other information I needed to know. I was beyond excited. I went out and bought a nice suit, a really nice suit. I spent five hundred bucks, which was a lot of money for us, because I still wasn’t making much. But I had the suit tailored and everything. It was perfect.
I showed up in my suit, and whoever I was reporting to said, “Come over here, kid. We need to cut the sleeves off of your suit.”
My five-hundred-dollar suit?
“You’re fucking kidding me,” I said.
“No, come here.”
“You’re really kidding me.”
Even here I look confused.
They weren’t. They cut the sleeves right off. I might just as well have taken out five hundred-dollar bills and set them on fire. At least I would have been warm for a second or two.
Then it got worse.
“Here, strap this thing on,” said somebody, holding out this big metal box in front of me. It was like a strongbox. It didn’t exactly look like a regular piece of wrestling gear.
“This is what you’re doing,” said the guy with the box. “This is your character: Deacon Batista.”
They put me out in this goofy suit and strapped this goofy box around my neck. They made me look like a cartoon character. I was a bodyguard for the Reverend D-Von. The box was supposed to be his cash box, where he put donations that he would collect from his congregation for his building fund.
I was totally confused. I was wearing a cut-up suit and carrying this dumb cash box around. I could have been anybody, dressed like a goon. They took away my star asset, my body, and I had no idea why.
Now I understand why they did it. They wanted to force me to learn how to work. They were doing it by taking away what I’d always relied on, my body, and forcing me to learn how to work the crowd with other tools. I wasn’t ready for the spotlight. Not by a long shot. I had dues to pay, and a lot to learn.
And WWE wasn’t exactly primed for me, either. D-Von couldn’t even pronounce my name right at first. When I came out he called me “Bas-ti-ta” or something like that. They had to voice over it later on before the show aired.
That first show I wasn’t in a match. I just came out with D-Von and looked menacing. The first thing I
ever did as a wrestling move was clothesline Triple H outside the ring. I knocked the crap out of him. That was my first TV spot ever.
The week after that, I started on live event tours.
At my first house show, I went out and somehow managed to split my pants, from the front top to the back top. I had white underwear on, and black pants, so it was obvious that my pants were split. Bill DeMott—he was wrestling as Hugh Morrus at the time—just started laughing. He made a huge scene out of it. You could hear him throughout the whole place: “Ah, he split his pants. He split his pants.”
The whole arena started laughing. I was trying to play this big tough bodyguard, and ten thousand people were laughing at me.
From then on, I wore black underwear.
THE BUILDING FUND
The gimmick with D-Von was pretty funny, and after a while the crowds got really into it. Basically, D-Von was a crooked preacher. So he’d come out with this basket and collect money for his building fund. Well, just before I got there, someone had stolen the money. So enter Deacon Batista, the protector of the building fund—that big metal box with the chain—and the protector of the Reverend D-Von.
The thing was, we’d go out and do a show, and as we walked up to the ring people would wave money at us for the building fund. Of course we’d grab it.
The fans really got into it. As soon as that first person came out with a dollar, everybody else started pulling money out of their pockets. They wanted to be part of the show. Some of this was on television but it was really big at house shows. Guys wanted to be funny, wanted to be big time, so they’d pull out twenties. I think once we even got a hundred-dollar bill.