Bully Ray Felt Stifled As A Performer During His Last Run With WWE

Bully Ray is known as one half of The Dudley Boyz with D-Von Dudley. The tag team is considered one of the most prolific in professional wrestling history. The duo have won over 20 tag team championships across multiple promotions. They debuted in WWE in 1999 and stayed with the company till 2005. After leaving for TNA and the indies, they came back a decade later to WWE in 2015.

Bully Ray has revealed that when he made his return to the WWE in 2015 with D-Von Dudley, he felt “stifled” as a performer. Ray recalled his second stint in the company while appearing on the Stories with Brisco and Bradshaw podcast.

Bully Ray said that there was a lack of freedom when he came back to the WWE. It’s because a performer had to run almost everything by an agent, and there were certain things that were off limits. Ray added that things that made a lot of money back in the Attitude Era can’t be done anymore. According to him, they wouldn’t have a good reason why they didn’t want certain things.

“When we went back in 2015, I remember feeling so stifled as a performer. Because you had to run almost everything by the agent, and being told that two guys don’t bump and feed for a comeback anymore, or that you can’t do this behind the ref’s back. Everything that worked in the Attitude Era that made all of us a lot of money, now you couldn’t do anymore. And there was not really a good reason why they didn’t want it done anymore. It’s just that they’d not want it done.

Advertising

Advertising

Ray also shared a story about dealing with an agent. Ray had come up with something different and he was passionate about it, and had asked his agent to run it by Vince McMahon. The agent said yes but he never spoke with Vince, and came back to Ray and lied that the boss didn’t like his idea.

 …I followed my agent for an hour, he never spoke with Vince, then he came back and said, ‘Yeah, Vince doesn’t want to do that’. I lose all the respect in the world for you. I would much rather you tell me to my face, ‘You know what, Bubba? I don’t want to talk with Vince right now. You go do it’.”

On the podcast, he also revealed that Vince had offered him a producer role too but he turned it down. He explained that he wouldn’t feel creatively satisfied in the role of a producer in the WWE.

h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the quotes