Former WWE superstar Batista has had a stunning wrestling career, but his journey did not have a great start. Batista’s body size became both a boon and a curse for him when he started wrestling. “The Animal” was rejected by the WCW Power Plant, but he had enough talent and charisma to sign a WWE contract. But even there, he faced an obstacle. Like many wrestlers in the early 2000s, Batista was also assigned to perform in the Ohio Valley Wrestling developmental territory.
Batista struggled a lot in the beginning
Batista recently appeared on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, where he revealed that his body size forced him to play a character called Leviathan in OVW, which stunted his development. “The character stunted my growth in OVW because I had nothing but squash matches. I went out and did two three moves and my matches were over. I had Goldberg matches. I didn’t progress like the rest of the guys,” said Batista.
This former WWE superstar helped him
The Animal stated that this was the worst moment of his wrestling career and he thought the company would release him. However, a former WWE superstar came to his rescue and helped him through his bad times. The WWE Superstar was none other than Fit Finlay, who is best known as Hornswoggle’s father.
When WWE sent Batista to work with veteran wrestlers and trainers as a last resort to save him, Finlay took him aside and asked him what was wrong with him. In a matter of minutes, Finlay told him things that completely changed his perspective on wrestling.
“Fit took me aside and started talking to me, like, ‘What’s wrong with you, man?’ More than the physical stuff, he just got in my head and made me look at things differently, and a lightbulb went off in my head,” said Batista.
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And thus Batista’s fortunes changed in the company. He made his main roster debut in 2002, which was the same time when other superstars from OVW like John Cena, Randy Orton and Brock Lesnar made their television debuts for OVW. Batista soon made his mark after his debut and his star power increased after he joined Triple H’s Evolution, which was a heel faction in WWE. At WrestleMania 21, Batista defeated The Game to win the WWE World Heavyweight Championship and never looked back after that.
