Ryback Explains Why His Pairing With Paul Heyman Didn’t Work

– Ryback recently appeared on Jim Ross’ podcast (transcript credit wrestlinginc.com), here are the highlights…

On Why He Was Paired With Heyman in 2013: “Paul needed somebody to buy him two or three months more on TV to extend his program with Punk. And they pulled me out of the bullying role that was going so well and put me with Paul.” Ryback recalled, “and that bullying role, even though ideally I would’ve still been babyface Ryback with the way things were the year before, I had embraced that role like I always did and I always did what was asked of me. It was actually a lot of fun. And I think they knew how much fun I was having with it and we stopped it, we put me with Paul, we let him do all his promos and do the majority of the talking, and I just stared and looked like the big, angry beast.”

On Respecting Heyman But Not Seeing Eye to Eye With Him: “I respect Paul a lot and he has been in this business a long time, but we did not see eye-to-eye, Jim. And I had to have many discussions with Paul because, you have to remember, Paul and CM Punk were really, really good friends. And Heyman was supposed to be, from a creative standpoint, working with me and whatnot. And he was with Punk all day and they were discussing business and what they were going to do and it wasn’t doing me any favors and I knew that.” Ryback added, “Paul knew he had to get away from me because I wanted to kill him at the time and he had went to Vince and Punk and they didn’t do me any favors in there, talking to Vince.”

On Working With Punk & Cena, Who Were Guys Trying to Keep Their Spot: “You’ve got to remember, when you’re dealing at the WWE level, and you’re dealing with those top spots, you’re dealing with millions of dollars. The two guys that I had all my problems with, and everybody else there, I get along with just fine, was John Cena and CM Punk. And I’m not wrong on this, there [are] only a certain amount of slots up there, and those guys had those slots, and they wanted to keep those slots. And I think everything kind of stemmed from that.” Ryback said, “I think it is an issue of the whole when it comes down to that amount of money and those top, elite spots, I think [Cena]’s very sensitive to that and I saw it firsthand. “I actually enjoyed wrestling John. Even when things weren’t perfect with us and we had gotten into verbal altercations and it never affected us going out to that ring, performing, and doing business. Not once.”