It been about a year since Jake Hager (Jack Swagger in WWE) was released from WWE. The former ECW and WWE World Heavyweight champion recently announced that he recently signed with Bellator MMA.
Hager, who is a former All-American amateur wrestler at the University of Oklahoma, was a recent guest on MMA Hour and talked about pitching to WWE about booking him in a legitimate fight.
“For the longest time there, I felt like I was literally the toughest guy in the locker room,” Hager told Ariel Helwani on a recent edition of The MMA Hour. “Yet, I would go out there and have two-minute matches with guys that couldn't hold my jock. It even got to the point where I pitched to them, I was like, ‘Look, I got something to prove. You guys are a great platform. Let me prove it. Pick the fighter — I’ll fight anybody. Put them on your show and I’ll fight them.’ They didn’t really want to go down that route."
"Let’s do something different, along those lines,” Hager said of his shoot fight pitch to WWE. “I don’t know if they just didn’t believe in my abilities, but now we’re here to show it. It’s crazy. Stuff like that always happens and it just got pushed to the side and I was like, Alright, well I’m still here. I'm gonna do do it. It’s a great opportunity that I’m gonna take advantage of.”
Hager also discusses talking to UFC first and still being involved in pro-wrestling. Check out the interview below.