Death Clutch - Brock Lesnar [43]
“I thought this was going to be mano a mano,” I told Vince. Obviously, he had other ideas.
“Well, Brock,” Vince said, setting the tone for the entire meeting, “John runs talent relations, and I would be disrespecting him if I asked him to leave this meeting. I’d be excusing him from a meeting that affects his entire department.”
All I could think of was, “Just get to the part about my deal. I’m not even here ten minutes, and I’m already sour on the experience!”
Before we could talk about money, Vince and John had to play their little games with me. John started talking about the tattoo on my chest, and actually asked me to take my shirt off.
Right there. In the middle of a business meeting. And not just any business meeting, either, but one where the people involved were trying to put a lot of bad blood behind them. There were issues that had had a lot of time to work themselves out, but both sides were still hot at each other. We’re trying to find a way to work together again, to make money with each other, and the head of the talent department wants me to take my damned shirt off in the chairman’s office so I can show off my new tattoo?
Screw that.
That’s when Vince stakes out his position, and tells me I’ll have to start all over again because I walked out on my first deal. “Start at the bottom, and work your way back up to the top!” he tells me. “That’s the only way this is going to work!”
Vince wasn’t talking about a push. He was talking payroll. I’d have to come back for a deal worth a lot less than I had been making. The fact that I’d left on top meant nothing. Vince was offering me a rookie deal, and he knew it was a complete insult.
It didn’t matter that my value was still high, that I put over Eddie Guerrero for the title and Goldberg at WrestleMania. It didn’t matter that I could be back on top in no time at all, or that I could be back drawing Vince big money with the right reintroduction, the right angle, even just the right promo.
Vince wanted to bully me like he does everyone else, because most people who end up on the outs with Vince McMahon don’t have a pot to piss in. They have to crawl back on their hands and knees, begging for scraps.
Well, I had a ton of problems and a tattoo that symbolized the sword I felt I had at my throat, but I wasn’t going to let anyone talk to me like I’m a piece of shit. Vince was talking to me like I was some low-life jerk-off who had nowhere else to go.
What Vince never understood about me is that I am, at heart, still a poor kid from that farm in Webster, South Dakota. Yes, I lived the life of a rock star for a few years in WWE, but I knew I could be happy with my future wife no matter what I did for a living or how much money I made.
If I had to farm for a living, I’d be one happy, hardworking farmer, married to the woman I love, and satisfied with myself because I never let anyone talk to me the way Vince did in that meeting. He could have had me back, almost one hundred percent on his terms, except with just a little concession about the schedule, and he blew it.
After I walked out of my “secret” meeting with Vince that day, I headed for the airport. Rena asked me on the phone what had happened, and I told her the meeting went well. I also told her that I had swallowed my pride, and it looked like I was going to go back to work for Vince. But before I made the final decision, I wanted to see the contract his lawyers were supposed to send to David Olsen. When we got Vince’s deal in writing, it still looked to me like a rookie deal, for rookie money, with no more days off than I had before. That was the moment I decided I was going to find out what the Inokis were willing to pay me to wrestle in Japan.
Brad Rheingans had been working with New Japan for about nineteen years, so I made sure I got him in on the deal. With Brad on my team, I had the perfect person to smarten me up to the Inokis’ way of doing business. I knew going to Japan could be a big score, but I also knew I was going to have to have a good strategy to get that kind