Let’s be honest, Batista’s last run in WWE wasn’t exactly one of his most successful, he may have won the Royal Rumble and in turn was able to main event WrestleMania, but he was hated by fans the entire time and was even given cute nicknames based on his outfits.
Batista hasn’t appeared in WWE for two and a half years, he has instead focused his time on acting and been a part of many globally successful films including Guardians of the Galaxy and James Bond’s latest outing in Spectre.
Many fans still believed that Batista would make one final appearance for WWE and compete in a retirement match, but it seems The Animal has now been caged for good.
In a recent interview, Batista stated that he would only return if he could do WWE Live Events rather than the weekly episodes of the show.
“At the end of the day, I love WWE, and I’ve proven that I wouldn’t wrestle anywhere else. I feel like wrestling anywhere else is a step-down. I love the company, and I’ll always be appreciative what they’ve done for me, and I would love to go back, it’s just that they’re really hard to deal with, and right now, my passion is acting. But if they would allow me to go back and just do house shows, I’d be all over it, because then you just skip over all the red tape — you don’t have to deal with any of the writers, or any of that bulls**t.”
The door will never fully be closed to Batista, who still remains in great shape as he turns 48 soon, but he is also a great candidate for a Hall of Fame induction in the next few years, so he may put his Hollywood lifestyle on hold one more time if he gets that call.