@AJ-xv7oh Dave strikes me as a man who always wants to be his best, regardless of circumstances. He's never looking to coast and get big guy roles, and it appears Leviathan/Batista were just big guy roles that he wanted to put more into and get more out of.
@@PettyCrow-n9c Did you watch the vid? He's not "basically saying that" at all, he very clearly gives credit to multiple people for various ways they helped him grow in OVW.
Batista lasted twice as long as Cornette thought he would and made more money than Jim Cornette ever did in the 30+ years that Cornette was in the business
@@andrewbowyer5043well Jim wasn’t a wrestler 😂 Plus I think Cornette just underestimated Batista’s work and mic skills. He just had a different vision but hey it worked out well for everyone
I think jim would probably say well if you weren't injured all the time maybe you'd get more ring time ...love both jim and dave they both make fair points
No, he's not being respectful imho. He's claiming that a gimmick that he did for 3 minutes every week on TV held him back. He had he same 7 days every week to get better that everyone else had. He's acting like he only had 3 minutes per week to get better. He actually had more time to improve than everyone else since his marches only take 3 minutes from the week, while everyone else is doing 5-20 minute matches. He had 15 minutes more per week than everyone else to allocate to improving.... but he chose not to. imagine getting up in the morning and wanting to go to the gym, but that damn gimmick is like a ghost, scaring you from improving. Lol That's what batista sounds like.
I get both perspectives - what I think Bautista is missing is that Cornette didn’t view OVW as training, he viewed it as a viable territory, and his primary job wasn’t actually to make Bautista better. To Cornette - a longer match would expose Bautista and hurt his matches/business. He used him as a squash guy for the benefit of OVW, while also training Bautista.
I think it was also that Cornette didn't see a long history with Batista, like he recognized the talent but he didn't think of him as a guy who would go for a really long time (like flair long) because of his temperament and his health. and weirdly the timeframe that cornette thought at the time turned out to be the amount of time Batista spent in the WWE.
Yep, WWE was ready to let Batista go, but when Triple H got wind of it, he wanted to take Batista under his wing and train him more to be ring ready, as Hunter had seen how much Jim had tried to do with him in OVW.
Cornette never saw this man to be a Megastar like he ended up being all his ass kissing fans of Jim won’t admit that this dude has his favorites just like a lot of other people did.
@@flyguy7825 Cornette has been on record saying that he built up Batista to be a main event opponent of the Undertaker tho? like he built him up as a monster to be in main events and even said "Look at him he's not going to be taking arm drags in the second match" he saw him as a megastar but because of his attitude and constantly being kinda sick he knew he wasn't going to be in the industry for ever and would eventually move on to better things. So he smashed him over and did everything he could for him and Batista basically did what Cornette thought he would. Thats not a rib on anyone.
@@doz222 I mean in an industry full of crazy, I'm okay picking the crazy yelly guy whos obsessed with history and somehow has a pretty clean history without abuse in regards to co-workers, employees, or substances (Santino I think you can make a case for but I never even liked that guy as a kid so meh lol). also its not like I'm picking sides here I think Batistas right and I think Cornette is right, the two arent impossible to reconcile.
He’s already explained his reasoning over the years there’s nothing new that he can say about it he literally said he didn’t see much in him and didn’t think that he was anywhere near the level of John Cena Randy Orton and Brock Lesnar so he saddled him with a gimmick and put him with the manager who ended up being Jim Cornette‘s wife in order to try and get him over and it was clear that that gimmick was never gonna get over on the main roster along with his abilities it took Triple H and Ric Flair to teach him
@@desiculture1947 Yeah he saw him in the main event, but he clearly didn’t see him as a world, champion and Hall of Famer that’s where a lot of his ass kissing fans will try and spin it
@@flyguy7825To be honest, the WWE front office didn't see anything in him either at first. They debuted him as Devon Dudley's stooge. if Triple H and Ric Flair didn't take Batista under their wing, he probably would have never improved enough to get to that level. How would you predict that the owner's son in law would take a shine to the guy who sat in the corner and never spoke to anyone? And Cornette isn't really responsible for Brock Lesnar's training. Lesnar didn't like OVW and left to train with Brad Rheingans in Minnesota. All Cornette did was throw him in a tag team with Shelton Benjamin and book him as a beast. The only three guys he really praises out of that class are Cena, Orton, and Benjamin.
He already addressed a similar comment once before. The TL:DR is just like literally every other time Cornette defends himsefl it wasn't his fault it was the other guy.
@libcrypt98 I didn't mean Davis, I mean that in literally every story Cornette has to have a them to build a us and them dynamic and they're always the problem, not him. Like I guarantee this response will talk nicely about Davis (if mentioned at all) but will put all the blame on Batista just like last time this conversation came up
Cornette has addressed this before. He gave Batista a monster heel push because he had no training at all and was so limited physically. He needed short matches otherwise his flaws would have been exposed. And he didn't ever suggest anything, he did ever tell anyone he wanted to do more like promos, he just kept quiet. Cornette did what he could.
@@fscorpion678His thinking was that Batista was already in his thirties then, with no prior training, and a tendency to get hurt. He's said that he thought Batista could have a five year run or so, but it'd have to be as a main eventer, so he pushed him like a monster. He'd need more time to become a refined wrestler, time I guess it was assumed he didn't have at that point. And that estimation of how long his run would be was pretty spot on in the end.
@@fscorpion678No, you have a misunderstanding. OVW is it’s own promotion that needs to sell tickets and get TV ratings. It just had a developmental deal with WWE. OVW wasn’t NXT. Jim was running a business.
I'm 100% that Cornette's rebuttal to this would be that they gave Dave that character because due to his many limitations and age at the time, that was the only character he could pull off.
As a huge fan of Jim Cornette AND Dave Batista I absolutely love this. Batista is just a class act all the way. He truly embodies the spirit of "I have no enemies." 😊
I think sometimes you have to accept the cards you are dealt and just roll with the punches. Bautista was going to be a monster. No-one wants to see a monster have technical wrestling matches. They want them to destroy thier opponents. If we are talking about stunted growth ask Kane how he felt about WWE handing him two of the worst gimmicks concurrently, almost destroying his career before he got started and still becoming the most iconic "monster" in all of wrestling. Even surpassing the Undertaker. Of course as you get older you are afforded introspection and retrospect. It's easy to look back in time and say "this, could have been better" "that could have been better." Dave entered wrestling at a pretty late age which is almost unheard of. Being completely green, he became a huge star in WWE in spite of being an introvert and essentially a non-wrestler and then went on to be a massive Hollywood star. I'd say things turned out pretty well.
@@flyguy7825 Look at any big man that has stepped into the ring in the WWE. The formula is always the same. They start off in Squash matches. They learn the basics with Jobbers so they don't hurt the stars or themselves for that matter. If you're a Big Show or a Mark Henry or a Braun Strowman... You don't need to be a good wrestler when you're a big man.. You need to be a dominant force. When Bautista got to The WWE he was fine for the most part. Was he an amazing wrestler? Nope... But he was 100x better than Hogan any day of the week. Dave is a cool dude and Corny has no shortage of faults, but I'm not sure what Dave's take is here. He Didn't have the Charisma or confidence to be the character wrestler he wanted to be at the start. (Obviously now we know he's quite capable.) And his size was going to preclude him from being a technical wrestler. Whatever did or did not happen in OVW doesn't matter. It's WWE where you have to prove yourself and he did.
based on everything i've heard from both sides about this i think its clear Jim and Dave weren't a good fit for each other in terms of mentor mentee relationship. Dave clearly found the help he needed to grow when he got to the main roster and presumably a bunch of that was from HHH as well as guys like Fit and Regal
@@gavo117 That doesn’t mean He would be a multitime world, champion, and a Hall of Famer!! lol he didn’t say that so please just say Jim is wrong!! Lol
@@flyguy7825 Not too worry I am sure Cornette will pull up on his pod soon and dedicate a whole segmen talking anywhere between 10 minutes to an hour about this 😅
@@jakep1979 yup and I’m not going to be watching it because he’s a broken record and a lot of his ass kissing fans think he’s God’s gift and he can never be wrong. He was 100% wrong about Bautista. He never saw this man as a main event Hall of Fame world champion.
@@flyguy7825 That's the funny thing about Cornette, it's like his kayfabe to never admit being wrong & everyone else are morons 🤣 I'm going to have to listen to his justification just for the laughs.
He makes a good point. Cornette was booking him to be a draw in a territory, rather than for the purpose of a developmental territory. That's partly the nature of the business model OVW had, which is very different from what NXT can do these days.
Cornette booked him as they did eventually. Batista's WWE career was short but impactful. He main evented within 3 years at Wrestlemania 21 when he debuted in 2002. He was injury prone and failed miserably as a top babyface because of that. His heel turn at 2009 was amazing and his peak. Everyone remembers Batista with great charisma, an amazing physique and powerhouse moves: Spinebuster and Batista Bomb.
"He was injury prone and failed miserably as a top babyface because of that". He was the face of Smackdown for almost 2 years, including a more than legendary rivlary with the Undertaker. That's around the same amount of time The Rock, Brock, HBK, and many bayfaces endured as top guys. He didn't fail miserably, maybe not as a good as Cena, but it was more than Ok.
Failed miserably as a babyface? Lol i dont get when people say this about him or like Triple H; like yeah their heel personas are their best, but their face runs were always great
John Cena, Randy Orton, Brock Lesnar and Batista. Those four guys have 43 World Championship reigns between them, seven Royal Rumble Match victories, turns as King of the Ring and Mr. Money in the Bank, and even a mixed martial arts championship and multiple box office successes. My God, did Jim Cornette build an incredible group of guys into world class talents.
Jim saw what Batista had to offer at the time and just chose to highlight that. He was there to learn and be ready for wwe and Jim didn’t do that for him.
The problem is, is that Dave shouldn't have blamed OVW for his "stunted growth in WWE", IF anything, it should have been fuckin' Vince McMahon who turned him into that stupid "Deacon Batista" character.
To be fair, it was a part of Cornette's job in OVW to assess each wrestler's potential and train accordingly. Jim is on the record saying he was impressed with Batista's look and physical abilities and saw him as a top guy to work with all of the big men in WWE but his career would likely be short due to his age and being injury prone. Hindsight is 20 20 but I think Jim was right to bill him as an unstoppable monster, which ended up being the most over gimmick in OVW, because he wasn't going to be taking arm drags and big bumps every night and it gave him the right image for WWE. Jim was also pretty bang on on how long his career ended up being.
Jim has talked many times about his frustrations with Batista in OVW. He was always cold and unsocial. Jim predicted that he'd be a top guy for 5 or so years. If you take away the time he lost from injuries, he was right.
It’s a fair assessment. OVW was a good starting point where he was able to learn the basic foundations of wrestling and was able to learn how to wrestle and work. The best thing to ever have to Dave was being put in Evolution where he was with Triple H and Flair and was taken under their wings and able to learn from them. Had it not been for that, he probably would have been released after the “Deacon Batista” character flopped and wouldn’t have had the career he had.
@@jumpingbombangels2856 Leviathan was born in mind of Undertaker's next big wrestlemania opponent. He went from "Leviathan" to "Deacon Batista" which if anything, stunted his growth in the wrestling business. Don't forget, Vince was ready to fire Dave's ass from the WWE because he wasn't bringing "anything to the dance", which Jim said happened in OVW, he would often or not sit on the side wearing a sweatshirt or hoodie, shaking from being cold and would take his wife's advice (his then wife). Jim mentioned the Leviathan/Kane match and he got Dave into the ring and Jim said "TELL Glenn what you WANT to do in the match" and Dave just went "Uhhh...i'm uh fine with whatever you want to do!"
Corny's lovers are too far up his ass that they can't disagree with him at all. I respect Corny and I'll happily disagree with him on many things. I don't care because I don't know the guy lol.
Jim was a Triple A manager trying to win that night’s ballgame against the Toledo Mud Hens, instead of making a guy use his curveball until he masters it, even if it means the other team scores 10 runs.
In the end it's about how you synergize with someone. I guess that Dave didn't get as along with him as HHH and Flair. It's about chosing the right people whom to work with and Batista definitely was able to do that and become one of the greatest superstars of all time despite being a late comer to the game.
It's pretty fair. Cornette is a booker, not a trainer. He's going to book the talent he has in the best way that he sees fit to do so, which at the time was about all Batista was able to do. Nobody's fault really, it's just what it was. Fit Finlay, William Regal and Dave Taylor are trainers, not bookers. Masters in the ring who can develop talent, but none of them are really known for their booking. They were what Batista needed. Ultimate blame probably rests with whoever sent him to OVW when he wasn't ready.
its basically what i think of jim. he has a love for the history of wrestling but he has this mindset of "my way works" and doesn't expand his horizons and lacks the understanding that wrestling evolves. that's what seperates him from guys like trips, regal, dusty, and heyman. i'm glad dave isn't bashing him but he is pointing out that flaw with how jim views wrestling and how it doesn't really change.
This is why I love the way NXT works now. A lot of those guys are getting a small, but important taste of what the main roster will be like and we get guys like Bron Breakker because of it.
It makes sense. Yeah they wanted batista to be their monster in ovw but he needed to learn more for when he would go to the main roster. He needs to be able to sell, he needs to be able to have some promo skills, he needs to be able to have a 15 minute match. I don't know what time evolution started pre planning but batista and randy were made for it. Randy is the prodigy and batista is the muscle/heavy/enforcer as the future part of evolution. You should prepare him to be that muscle that the baby face attacks to hype up for the match agianst triple h.
In all fairness, the only person from that class that wasnt stunted, was Brock. Cena had a rough promo game and no real character until Thuganomics, Orton had no direction and It wasnt until Evolution that he figured out what he had to do. Shelton never got out of mid card or had a memorable run, other than his Team Angle/ IC title reign, even though he was extremely talented in ring and had an awesome match with Shawn. Brock was the only one that came from OVW in that class and clicked in WWE, immediately
Fair criticism. I get why Jim Cornette put that character on him. 100%. But I think his criticism is still fair and correct. A miscalculation on Jims part even if Jim did guess how short of a career Batista would have wrestling. I liked Leviathan as a gimmick. But Jim could have allowed the character to develop more and try some other stuff. Especially if Batista was slated to go to the main roster. But also I wasn't there.
I remember Cornette saying that Batista was shy and that he was terrified when he had to work with Kane in OVW. That he had to make Batista spit out his gimmick to Kane and other stuff. Also Batista said on Jericho's podcast that he got kicked out of an Arena looking for Cornette.
Anybody could have been the head of OVW with this class of guys and they would have been successful. The fact that it took someone else to get Batista to where he needed to be speaks more about Cornett than Batista.
This is an updated take on what he once said in the past. When asked about OVW years ago, Dave claimed it was a waste of time and that he didn’t learn anything at all. At least now he’s able to admit that Cornette and OVW did have a big impact on his career, he just wishes it would have gone a little differently
I feel like the progression with Dave’s work would have progressed in OVW had he not been pulled to the main roster so soon. Cornette couldn’t control when his guys were taken from him.
I would think the Deacon Batista spot was a lot more detrimental than Jim pushing Dave as the big jacked up monster that fitted his look and abilities at the time
Jim will probably repeat, that Batista would sit there in a hoodie, being cold, injured all the time. He looked great, but was older, couldn't wrestle, obviously couldn't move like Shelton or Lesnar, so had to have very short matches, not to expose his lack of skill. No mic time, because he wasn't the eloquent talker he is now - a quarter of a century later. Did Cornette use him right? Or best considering his abilities? Well.. ..soon after wwe used him to carry a briefcase, wear a big chain a pull menacing faces - not all that much better than Leviathan (which of course was a stupid gimmick, all supernatural gimmicks are stupid - it's just that some can make them work despite how ridiculous they are). On the other hand, they used Steve Austin as the Ringmaster, Glenn Jacobs was an evil dentist, they thought Bastion Booger was a good idea... Batista was obviously capable of doing way more than he did - but was he really able to do it even back then? Was he showing his potential, his personality? Or did it take him many, many years to uncover this layer? Nevertheless, looking at Batista today, he's obviously dedicated and talented, he's very likely right, that he needed a different kind of guidance. Maybe he couldn't communicate properly, didn't have the mindset and skills he had yet to develop..or was "criminally" misunderstood. Who knows. They can both be right...just have a different perspective.
Looking back it actually isn’t bad what they did to him. He looked like a monster, and it makes sense. You don’t really expect as massive as him to have 15 minute matches. But Batista is right also, he can definitely do a long matches. He can do more than Goldberg-type matches.
Just for reference if other fans were curious, definitely agree with Dave's claims based on this vid: ua-cam.com/video/OOKwT_T7Q6s/v-deo.html - If you have two enormous talents like Shelton and Dave go at it with only having Shelton land a crossbody and aerial takedown proceeding to Dave winning with a DDT it's definitely understandable how the matches would not help him grow overall
Batista made a really good point here. I just really hope Corny listens to this and doesn’t say some stupid shit like he’s prone to do sometimes, and that’s coming from a guy who’s a big fan of his podcasts.
There was probably a lack of communication as Jim has said Dave was overly timid in the locker room. I don't see any problem having squash matches because Jim probably wanted to instill the "big guy" working mentality from the beginning. You move slow, every move is devastating, and you seem impossible to beat. That way, when it's time to elevate someone else, just being able to stagger you or knock you down is enough to get them over i.e. Hogan Andre
That's crazy that they had Steve Regal, Dave Taylor, and Fit Finley all in the same place. The 3 UK brawlers. That'd be like if their staff was Hulk Hogan, Jessie Ventura, and Billie Graham. F*ckin triplets.
I love Batista…but I don’t think he never understood that the reason why he wasn’t speaking in the mic and he was having short matches was because his abilities were not there yet but they were pressuring Jim in to making money with him so that’s why Jim used his strengths and hid his weaknesses
Makes some sense. Dave Batista did look out of sorts in his first 18 months in WWE. Wasn't until late 2003 that he started showing potential. At least he respects Cornette
I mean based on a lot of jims rants on Dave, he gavebhim the Bull Goldberg push because he saw Dave as someone who should nevwr be beat, nor sell, and was a guy youbwanted to keep on top because you'd obly have him for handful of years due to his age and injury risks, and thats what WWE got out of Dave. Maybe Dave needed to learn some more, but Jim also says, Dave never spoke up and just did whatever people told him. So, yeah take it for whatbyou will
Watch the full interview with Batista on my main channel here: ua-cam.com/video/017JuHsSN6E/v-deo.html
Please interview Jim Cornette it’ll break the iwc
“Jim I have some Audio here that listeners have been sending in”
I can hear it Brian's voice so clear
aaand it just happened
😆
🤣🤣🤣🤣
That was a fair criticism IMO. A Goldberg push during training doesn't give anyone the skills needed to be a professional wrestler.
Corney pushed him like that because of his age and for being injury prone
There was no other good option, Cornette explains it very well
It worked out okay for Goldberg
Batista couldn't be anything else. It's strange how Dave can't see that.
@AJ-xv7oh Dave strikes me as a man who always wants to be his best, regardless of circumstances. He's never looking to coast and get big guy roles, and it appears Leviathan/Batista were just big guy roles that he wanted to put more into and get more out of.
It's much fairer than his earlier comment that "he didn't learn anything in OVW"
He's basically saying that though lol
@@PettyCrow-n9c At least here is is acknowledging he learned about the history and the traditions of wrestling. Which is more than nothing.
@@PettyCrow-n9c Did you watch the vid? He's not "basically saying that" at all, he very clearly gives credit to multiple people for various ways they helped him grow in OVW.
Years ago he did indeed say he learnt nothing there. He's older now and off the roids so he gave a more mature answer.
Yeah now that hes elaborated and reworded a bit i totally get where hes coming from
"I said to Batista. If you had my Braind and I had your Body. We could both retire in five years" - Jim Cornette
Hence Lesnar using Heyman as a mouthpiece.
Amazing quote ngl
Batista lasted twice as long as Cornette thought he would and made more money than Jim Cornette ever did in the 30+ years that Cornette was in the business
@@andrewbowyer5043well Jim wasn’t a wrestler 😂
Plus I think Cornette just underestimated Batista’s work and mic skills. He just had a different vision but hey it worked out well for everyone
@@andrewbowyer5043Batist lastes twice as long? Explain please.
I love Corny. And this was no criticism at all. Hes being completely respectful.
I think jim would probably say well if you weren't injured all the time maybe you'd get more ring time ...love both jim and dave they both make fair points
No, he's not being respectful imho. He's claiming that a gimmick that he did for 3 minutes every week on TV held him back.
He had he same 7 days every week to get better that everyone else had. He's acting like he only had 3 minutes per week to get better.
He actually had more time to improve than everyone else since his marches only take 3 minutes from the week, while everyone else is doing 5-20 minute matches.
He had 15 minutes more per week than everyone else to allocate to improving.... but he chose not to.
imagine getting up in the morning and wanting to go to the gym, but that damn gimmick is like a ghost, scaring you from improving. Lol
That's what batista sounds like.
I get both perspectives - what I think Bautista is missing is that Cornette didn’t view OVW as training, he viewed it as a viable territory, and his primary job wasn’t actually to make Bautista better.
To Cornette - a longer match would expose Bautista and hurt his matches/business. He used him as a squash guy for the benefit of OVW, while also training Bautista.
I think it was also that Cornette didn't see a long history with Batista, like he recognized the talent but he didn't think of him as a guy who would go for a really long time (like flair long) because of his temperament and his health. and weirdly the timeframe that cornette thought at the time turned out to be the amount of time Batista spent in the WWE.
Yep, WWE was ready to let Batista go, but when Triple H got wind of it, he wanted to take Batista under his wing and train him more to be ring ready, as Hunter had seen how much Jim had tried to do with him in OVW.
Cornette never saw this man to be a Megastar like he ended up being all his ass kissing fans of Jim won’t admit that this dude has his favorites just like a lot of other people did.
@@flyguy7825 Cornette has been on record saying that he built up Batista to be a main event opponent of the Undertaker tho? like he built him up as a monster to be in main events and even said "Look at him he's not going to be taking arm drags in the second match" he saw him as a megastar but because of his attitude and constantly being kinda sick he knew he wasn't going to be in the industry for ever and would eventually move on to better things. So he smashed him over and did everything he could for him and Batista basically did what Cornette thought he would. Thats not a rib on anyone.
@maluse227 here is member number one of the cornette cult
@@doz222 I mean in an industry full of crazy, I'm okay picking the crazy yelly guy whos obsessed with history and somehow has a pretty clean history without abuse in regards to co-workers, employees, or substances (Santino I think you can make a case for but I never even liked that guy as a kid so meh lol). also its not like I'm picking sides here I think Batistas right and I think Cornette is right, the two arent impossible to reconcile.
John Cena
Randy Orton
Shelton Benjamin
Batista
Brock Lesnar
Victoria
Rico
Charlie Haas
Orlando Jordan
René Dupree
Mark Jindrak
Class was so stacked
Technically Jindrak had already had a stint in WCW beforehand but still a good point.
@@insignificantaftermathPROJECTSBatista too
@@SharkVshoreBatista wasn’t ever with WCW he did a tryout with the power plant and got kicked out but he wasn’t on television like Jindrak
@@Jonesyyy12 oh yeah you’re right
VICTORIA mentioned!
I don't think Cornette can be too mad about this. Seems like a pretty reasonable critique. And I am sure Cornette will explains his reasons.
He’s already explained his reasoning over the years there’s nothing new that he can say about it he literally said he didn’t see much in him and didn’t think that he was anywhere near the level of John Cena Randy Orton and Brock Lesnar so he saddled him with a gimmick and put him with the manager who ended up being Jim Cornette‘s wife in order to try and get him over and it was clear that that gimmick was never gonna get over on the main roster along with his abilities it took Triple H and Ric Flair to teach him
@@flyguy7825 That all, also sounds pretty reasonable. TY.
@@desiculture1947 Yeah he saw him in the main event, but he clearly didn’t see him as a world, champion and Hall of Famer that’s where a lot of his ass kissing fans will try and spin it
@@flyguy7825To be honest, the WWE front office didn't see anything in him either at first. They debuted him as Devon Dudley's stooge. if Triple H and Ric Flair didn't take Batista under their wing, he probably would have never improved enough to get to that level. How would you predict that the owner's son in law would take a shine to the guy who sat in the corner and never spoke to anyone?
And Cornette isn't really responsible for Brock Lesnar's training. Lesnar didn't like OVW and left to train with Brad Rheingans in Minnesota. All Cornette did was throw him in a tag team with Shelton Benjamin and book him as a beast. The only three guys he really praises out of that class are Cena, Orton, and Benjamin.
Years ago Batista said he learned nothing from OVW. That's very different from this response which is more measured and nuanced.
I’m so glad people still count Shelton
Seems like a totally reasonable and well-articulated point of view. I’m looking forward to Jim’s rebuttal on his show now
We all can't wait for Cornette response 😂
He is probably gonna put Batista down.
@@TheTalk23 His ego will never allow him to admit that Batista is right
He already addressed a similar comment once before. The TL:DR is just like literally every other time Cornette defends himsefl it wasn't his fault it was the other guy.
@libcrypt98 I didn't mean Davis, I mean that in literally every story Cornette has to have a them to build a us and them dynamic and they're always the problem, not him. Like I guarantee this response will talk nicely about Davis (if mentioned at all) but will put all the blame on Batista just like last time this conversation came up
@@blatherskype25 howi is Batista right. corny job was to get him in the wwe- and he did.
If batista learned something from corny, its how to dress!
Cornette has addressed this before. He gave Batista a monster heel push because he had no training at all and was so limited physically. He needed short matches otherwise his flaws would have been exposed. And he didn't ever suggest anything, he did ever tell anyone he wanted to do more like promos, he just kept quiet. Cornette did what he could.
Another jimbo apologist
Which is insane because he could've just trained and developed him, which is what OVW is for.
@@fscorpion678His thinking was that Batista was already in his thirties then, with no prior training, and a tendency to get hurt. He's said that he thought Batista could have a five year run or so, but it'd have to be as a main eventer, so he pushed him like a monster. He'd need more time to become a refined wrestler, time I guess it was assumed he didn't have at that point. And that estimation of how long his run would be was pretty spot on in the end.
@@fscorpion678OVW was also partly owned by Cornette and he needed to make money from ticket sales, etc. WWE didn't cover the cost of the promotion.
@@fscorpion678No, you have a misunderstanding.
OVW is it’s own promotion that needs to sell tickets and get TV ratings. It just had a developmental deal with WWE.
OVW wasn’t NXT. Jim was running a business.
Cornette has said Batista was sitting around always being cold lol
I remember hearing that. It was that and something about him being on the phone with his wife all the time or something
I'm 100% that Cornette's rebuttal to this would be that they gave Dave that character because due to his many limitations and age at the time, that was the only character he could pull off.
he defintly improved . unlike greenberg
As a huge fan of Jim Cornette AND Dave Batista I absolutely love this. Batista is just a class act all the way. He truly embodies the spirit of "I have no enemies." 😊
Cornette definitely does not embody that spirit
@@JizzlamicState Definitely not, every day Corny wakes up and chooses violence. He and Batista could not be any different in that regard. 🤣
I think sometimes you have to accept the cards you are dealt and just roll with the punches. Bautista was going to be a monster. No-one wants to see a monster have technical wrestling matches. They want them to destroy thier opponents. If we are talking about stunted growth ask Kane how he felt about WWE handing him two of the worst gimmicks concurrently, almost destroying his career before he got started and still becoming the most iconic "monster" in all of wrestling. Even surpassing the Undertaker. Of course as you get older you are afforded introspection and retrospect. It's easy to look back in time and say "this, could have been better" "that could have been better." Dave entered wrestling at a pretty late age which is almost unheard of. Being completely green, he became a huge star in WWE in spite of being an introvert and essentially a non-wrestler and then went on to be a massive Hollywood star. I'd say things turned out pretty well.
yep, Dave even admitted that he was at the age where wrestlers get OUT of the business.
Yeah he could of got injured and not ever got famous if he was having 20 minute matches in ovw at that age working with green guys
The irony here being that Kane was Jim Cornette's idea.
@@dilpickles5928 BS!!Jim didn’t even give this man a chance to grown as a wrestler
@@flyguy7825 Look at any big man that has stepped into the ring in the WWE. The formula is always the same. They start off in Squash matches. They learn the basics with Jobbers so they don't hurt the stars or themselves for that matter. If you're a Big Show or a Mark Henry or a Braun Strowman... You don't need to be a good wrestler when you're a big man.. You need to be a dominant force. When Bautista got to The WWE he was fine for the most part. Was he an amazing wrestler? Nope... But he was 100x better than Hogan any day of the week. Dave is a cool dude and Corny has no shortage of faults, but I'm not sure what Dave's take is here. He Didn't have the Charisma or confidence to be the character wrestler he wanted to be at the start. (Obviously now we know he's quite capable.) And his size was going to preclude him from being a technical wrestler. Whatever did or did not happen in OVW doesn't matter. It's WWE where you have to prove yourself and he did.
fair criticism of corny
No, it's not, he just he thinks he could of grown himself
@@petebagwell6666You should watch this again because you clearly didn't understand his point
I’m not used to seeing Dave without the body mass.
based on everything i've heard from both sides about this i think its clear Jim and Dave weren't a good fit for each other in terms of mentor mentee relationship. Dave clearly found the help he needed to grow when he got to the main roster and presumably a bunch of that was from HHH as well as guys like Fit and Regal
They weren't a good fit because Jim is an out of touch asshole.
Just watch your full interview it's so awesome. 😊
Glad you enjoyed it!
He was huge, he was older, and he was injury prone. It was monster or bust. Cornette estimated he'd get 5 years in his original run and he was close.
No he really wasn’t close lol The dude became more than just a wrestler he became a megastar Cornette didn’t even foresee him being that!!
@@flyguy7825 Cornette said he was gonna be in the main event or nothing so yes he did.
He was injuryprone on the main roster too. His run did last 8 years total (2002-2010)
@@gavo117 That doesn’t mean He would be a multitime world, champion, and a Hall of Famer!! lol he didn’t say that so please just say Jim is wrong!! Lol
@@smarkslowplay3512 more like 12 did yall forget about his comebacks lol
Jim Cornette just Crushed in anger the Diet Sprite can he had in his hand
Why because Batista is telling his truth Cornette is not perfect
Sprite Zero to be exact😅
@@flyguy7825 Not too worry I am sure Cornette will pull up on his pod soon and dedicate a whole segmen talking anywhere between 10 minutes to an hour about this 😅
@@jakep1979 yup and I’m not going to be watching it because he’s a broken record and a lot of his ass kissing fans think he’s God’s gift and he can never be wrong. He was 100% wrong about Bautista. He never saw this man as a main event Hall of Fame world champion.
@@flyguy7825 That's the funny thing about Cornette, it's like his kayfabe to never admit being wrong & everyone else are morons 🤣 I'm going to have to listen to his justification just for the laughs.
💯 agree. Cornett, McMahon and Pritchard never had a bad idea 😂
He makes a good point. Cornette was booking him to be a draw in a territory, rather than for the purpose of a developmental territory. That's partly the nature of the business model OVW had, which is very different from what NXT can do these days.
Cornette booked him as they did eventually. Batista's WWE career was short but impactful. He main evented within 3 years at Wrestlemania 21 when he debuted in 2002. He was injury prone and failed miserably as a top babyface because of that. His heel turn at 2009 was amazing and his peak.
Everyone remembers Batista with great charisma, an amazing physique and powerhouse moves: Spinebuster and Batista Bomb.
"He was injury prone and failed miserably as a top babyface because of that". He was the face of Smackdown for almost 2 years, including a more than legendary rivlary with the Undertaker. That's around the same amount of time The Rock, Brock, HBK, and many bayfaces endured as top guys. He didn't fail miserably, maybe not as a good as Cena, but it was more than Ok.
Failed miserably as a babyface? Lol i dont get when people say this about him or like Triple H; like yeah their heel personas are their best, but their face runs were always great
John Cena, Randy Orton, Brock Lesnar and Batista. Those four guys have 43 World Championship reigns between them, seven Royal Rumble Match victories, turns as King of the Ring and Mr. Money in the Bank, and even a mixed martial arts championship and multiple box office successes.
My God, did Jim Cornette build an incredible group of guys into world class talents.
Jim saw what Batista had to offer at the time and just chose to highlight that. He was there to learn and be ready for wwe and Jim didn’t do that for him.
The problem is, is that Dave shouldn't have blamed OVW for his "stunted growth in WWE", IF anything, it should have been fuckin' Vince McMahon who turned him into that stupid "Deacon Batista" character.
@@GenGamesUniverseHe didn’t blameOVW he blamed the creative and How Jim Cornett saw him as which he was 100% wrong on
@@flyguy7825he wasn’t wrong lmao Batista was green as f. He couldn’t work an actual match lol had to be booked to squash people like Goldberg
@@GenGamesUniverse And there it is on cue, the "blame Vince McMahon for everything" argument.
@@Axs_Nice_Hair Batista was the Goldberg of that OVW group.
Tbh as much as I respect JC, Dave does have a really good point here.
To be fair, it was a part of Cornette's job in OVW to assess each wrestler's potential and train accordingly. Jim is on the record saying he was impressed with Batista's look and physical abilities and saw him as a top guy to work with all of the big men in WWE but his career would likely be short due to his age and being injury prone. Hindsight is 20 20 but I think Jim was right to bill him as an unstoppable monster, which ended up being the most over gimmick in OVW, because he wasn't going to be taking arm drags and big bumps every night and it gave him the right image for WWE. Jim was also pretty bang on on how long his career ended up being.
His voice is EXACTLY like Jeff Goldblum’s now
I can see him drinking a banana smoothie in a pink bath robe when he talks. He was never gonna be Brock. 😂
Nah you are losing the plot
He sounds nothing like Jeff Goldblum😂
Unlike Batista, Jeff comes off as eccentric when he speaks
They were both in Hotel Artemis and didn't sound alike.
Getting under the wing of Fit/Regal is the best road to take imo
Jim has talked many times about his frustrations with Batista in OVW. He was always cold and unsocial. Jim predicted that he'd be a top guy for 5 or so years. If you take away the time he lost from injuries, he was right.
Shout out to Fit Finlay and William Regal.
He still down to earth and chill. He did not lose his soul 👍
The more I hear Batista talk the more I genuinely like him as a person
Welllll, tune into the drive-through next week!
"I had Goldberg matches." That was SO funny.🤣
It’s a fair assessment. OVW was a good starting point where he was able to learn the basic foundations of wrestling and was able to learn how to wrestle and work.
The best thing to ever have to Dave was being put in Evolution where he was with Triple H and Flair and was taken under their wings and able to learn from them. Had it not been for that, he probably would have been released after the “Deacon Batista” character flopped and wouldn’t have had the career he had.
What Dave fails to mention is that he was in his mid-thirties and injury prone so having long matches may have led to career ending injuries
At the end of the day Batista was right. Just because some of y’all love Jim doesn’t mean he can’t be wrong about something.
I love Jim but that was a dumb gimmick.
@@jumpingbombangels2856um no leviathan was awesome. He was over. Stop the bullshit
@@jumpingbombangels2856 Leviathan was born in mind of Undertaker's next big wrestlemania opponent. He went from "Leviathan" to "Deacon Batista" which if anything, stunted his growth in the wrestling business. Don't forget, Vince was ready to fire Dave's ass from the WWE because he wasn't bringing "anything to the dance", which Jim said happened in OVW, he would often or not sit on the side wearing a sweatshirt or hoodie, shaking from being cold and would take his wife's advice (his then wife). Jim mentioned the Leviathan/Kane match and he got Dave into the ring and Jim said "TELL Glenn what you WANT to do in the match" and Dave just went "Uhhh...i'm uh fine with whatever you want to do!"
Corny's lovers are too far up his ass that they can't disagree with him at all. I respect Corny and I'll happily disagree with him on many things. I don't care because I don't know the guy lol.
@@Michael-tj5bk not even Batista himself agrees
Jim was a Triple A manager trying to win that night’s ballgame against the Toledo Mud Hens, instead of making a guy use his curveball until he masters it, even if it means the other team scores 10 runs.
In the end it's about how you synergize with someone. I guess that Dave didn't get as along with him as HHH and Flair. It's about chosing the right people whom to work with and Batista definitely was able to do that and become one of the greatest superstars of all time despite being a late comer to the game.
Lets say how it is, if we look at who came out of OVW, Cornette had done a good job.
It's pretty fair.
Cornette is a booker, not a trainer. He's going to book the talent he has in the best way that he sees fit to do so, which at the time was about all Batista was able to do. Nobody's fault really, it's just what it was.
Fit Finlay, William Regal and Dave Taylor are trainers, not bookers. Masters in the ring who can develop talent, but none of them are really known for their booking. They were what Batista needed.
Ultimate blame probably rests with whoever sent him to OVW when he wasn't ready.
its basically what i think of jim. he has a love for the history of wrestling but he has this mindset of "my way works" and doesn't expand his horizons and lacks the understanding that wrestling evolves. that's what seperates him from guys like trips, regal, dusty, and heyman.
i'm glad dave isn't bashing him but he is pointing out that flaw with how jim views wrestling and how it doesn't really change.
He was so much more than a meat head, I think it bothered him being so intelligent being seen that way
Fair criticism. Can’t even see Jim being mad at it
thank you chris for Giving Us What We Want!
That was a fair assessment dave
This is why I love the way NXT works now. A lot of those guys are getting a small, but important taste of what the main roster will be like and we get guys like Bron Breakker because of it.
That’s fair, he’s not disrespectful
It makes sense. Yeah they wanted batista to be their monster in ovw but he needed to learn more for when he would go to the main roster. He needs to be able to sell, he needs to be able to have some promo skills, he needs to be able to have a 15 minute match. I don't know what time evolution started pre planning but batista and randy were made for it. Randy is the prodigy and batista is the muscle/heavy/enforcer as the future part of evolution. You should prepare him to be that muscle that the baby face attacks to hype up for the match agianst triple h.
Dave, Randy, John, Shelton, Hass, and Brock. OVW 2002 class will never be duplicated.
Dave Taylor and Fit did a lot to preserve wrestling!
I’m 6’4” and 300lbs and I’m squashing guys…..? Um yeah
Made me laugh Gunther telling Bret that Goldberg is his favourite wrestler 🤣
He even called him Bill Goldberg, which made it even more funny
@@WeedhustleloverespectI’m still laughing.
In all fairness, the only person from that class that wasnt stunted, was Brock. Cena had a rough promo game and no real character until Thuganomics, Orton had no direction and It wasnt until Evolution that he figured out what he had to do. Shelton never got out of mid card or had a memorable run, other than his Team Angle/ IC title reign, even though he was extremely talented in ring and had an awesome match with Shawn. Brock was the only one that came from OVW in that class and clicked in WWE, immediately
Fair criticism. I get why Jim Cornette put that character on him. 100%. But I think his criticism is still fair and correct. A miscalculation on Jims part even if Jim did guess how short of a career Batista would have wrestling.
I liked Leviathan as a gimmick. But Jim could have allowed the character to develop more and try some other stuff. Especially if Batista was slated to go to the main roster. But also I wasn't there.
I remember Cornette saying that Batista was shy and that he was terrified when he had to work with Kane in OVW. That he had to make Batista spit out his gimmick to Kane and other stuff.
Also Batista said on Jericho's podcast that he got kicked out of an Arena looking for Cornette.
"Like Musoooonllliiiniieee and Kennedyyyy" - Corney
I hope to hear Jim's response to this.
I love that suit that Batista is wearing, very sharp and dapper
Anybody could have been the head of OVW with this class of guys and they would have been successful. The fact that it took someone else to get Batista to where he needed to be speaks more about Cornett than Batista.
van Vlietttt, YEAH
That yeah always gets me everytime haha
Is it you saying “YEAH”
This is an updated take on what he once said in the past. When asked about OVW years ago, Dave claimed it was a waste of time and that he didn’t learn anything at all. At least now he’s able to admit that Cornette and OVW did have a big impact on his career, he just wishes it would have gone a little differently
I feel like the progression with Dave’s work would have progressed in OVW had he not been pulled to the main roster so soon. Cornette couldn’t control when his guys were taken from him.
His point is super valid
I would think the Deacon Batista spot was a lot more detrimental than Jim pushing Dave as the big jacked up monster that fitted his look and abilities at the time
Well said Dave 👏
Jim will probably repeat, that Batista would sit there in a hoodie, being cold, injured all the time. He looked great, but was older, couldn't wrestle, obviously couldn't move like Shelton or Lesnar, so had to have very short matches, not to expose his lack of skill. No mic time, because he wasn't the eloquent talker he is now - a quarter of a century later. Did Cornette use him right? Or best considering his abilities? Well..
..soon after wwe used him to carry a briefcase, wear a big chain a pull menacing faces - not all that much better than Leviathan (which of course was a stupid gimmick, all supernatural gimmicks are stupid - it's just that some can make them work despite how ridiculous they are). On the other hand, they used Steve Austin as the Ringmaster, Glenn Jacobs was an evil dentist, they thought Bastion Booger was a good idea...
Batista was obviously capable of doing way more than he did - but was he really able to do it even back then? Was he showing his potential, his personality? Or did it take him many, many years to uncover this layer?
Nevertheless, looking at Batista today, he's obviously dedicated and talented, he's very likely right, that he needed a different kind of guidance. Maybe he couldn't communicate properly, didn't have the mindset and skills he had yet to develop..or was "criminally" misunderstood. Who knows. They can both be right...just have a different perspective.
Looking back it actually isn’t bad what they did to him. He looked like a monster, and it makes sense. You don’t really expect as massive as him to have 15 minute matches. But Batista is right also, he can definitely do a long matches. He can do more than Goldberg-type matches.
As part of the cult of Cornette I don't think this is libelous. Fair is fair, but I can't wait for Cornette to respond.
There’s always 2 sides
to a story everything isn’t “my team vs your team” 👍
that’s why when he came to WWE he finally had great longer matches.
I like both guys. This seems fair.
Reminder that he was Deacon Batista in his debut, so the WWE office also didn’t see much in him at first.
Hopefully when this is brought to Jim’s attention he has a measured, understanding response.
That couldn't of been a more fair criticism.
Can't wait hear what Jim has to say about this
Cornettes reaction is gonna be nuclear
Respect that statement..
Just for reference if other fans were curious, definitely agree with Dave's claims based on this vid:
ua-cam.com/video/OOKwT_T7Q6s/v-deo.html
- If you have two enormous talents like Shelton and Dave go at it with only having Shelton land a crossbody and aerial takedown proceeding to Dave winning with a DDT it's definitely understandable how the matches would not help him grow overall
Someone please send this to Cornette
Dave Goldblumtista never disappoints...
“ I had Goldberg matches “ lmao 😂
His point is valid
The drive thru is now open.
Batista made a really good point here. I just really hope Corny listens to this and doesn’t say some stupid shit like he’s prone to do sometimes, and that’s coming from a guy who’s a big fan of his podcasts.
Jim and Dave both have very valid points about this, they are both civil and respect each other.
There was probably a lack of communication as Jim has said Dave was overly timid in the locker room. I don't see any problem having squash matches because Jim probably wanted to instill the "big guy" working mentality from the beginning. You move slow, every move is devastating, and you seem impossible to beat. That way, when it's time to elevate someone else, just being able to stagger you or knock you down is enough to get them over i.e. Hogan Andre
Well Cornette podcast is going to be very Interesting this week with the All Out mess,Stephen P New and JR beef now what Batista said about him
Well I guess there’s truth to that since before he was working with Finlay, he was saying things like “basketballs don’t hold grudges”
That's crazy that they had Steve Regal, Dave Taylor, and Fit Finley all in the same place. The 3 UK brawlers. That'd be like if their staff was Hulk Hogan, Jessie Ventura, and Billie Graham. F*ckin triplets.
I love Batista…but I don’t think he never understood that the reason why he wasn’t speaking in the mic and he was having short matches was because his abilities were not there yet but they were pressuring Jim in to making money with him so that’s why Jim used his strengths and hid his weaknesses
Makes some sense. Dave Batista did look out of sorts in his first 18 months in WWE. Wasn't until late 2003 that he started showing potential.
At least he respects Cornette
I mean based on a lot of jims rants on Dave, he gavebhim the Bull Goldberg push because he saw Dave as someone who should nevwr be beat, nor sell, and was a guy youbwanted to keep on top because you'd obly have him for handful of years due to his age and injury risks, and thats what WWE got out of Dave. Maybe Dave needed to learn some more, but Jim also says, Dave never spoke up and just did whatever people told him. So, yeah take it for whatbyou will
finlay and regal . respect
Best class of wwe super stars ever Brock randy cena batista