Jesse Ventura Rejected WWE’s First Offer for Saturday Night’s Main Event Return

Jesse Ventura is back in WWE, but it wasn’t an easy deal to close. The WWE Hall of Famer made it clear that the first offer he received wasn’t good enough—and he didn’t hesitate to send it back.

With Saturday Night’s Main Event returning to NBC and Peacock, Ventura has joined the broadcast team, working as an analyst alongside Joe Tessitore while also calling a match on the show. But according to The Body himself, WWE’s initial offer didn’t meet his standards.

Speaking on The Body Shop, Ventura revealed that Triple H was the one who pushed for his return, but when the company came in with their first deal, he wasn’t impressed.

“Along came Saturday Night’s Main Event and Triple H was on the plane and I guess he’s thinking, ‘God, do you think we could get Jesse back? You know, to actually do the broadcast?’ So they approach with that, and they made an initial offer, which wasn’t quite good enough and I countered them and they came back real solid and no ifs, ands, buts. It was a good negotiation.”

Initially, Ventura was only supposed to appear once, but he turned the tables on WWE.

“We agreed at first only to do one. They’re doing four. But they wanted me for a whole day’s publicity. So I said, ‘Alright, if I come out a day ahead of time and I do a whole day’s publicity, it’s gotta be for more than one show.’ I said, ‘I wanna guarantee for all four then.’ Then I get all four shows. They came back and said, ‘No problem.’ No problem whatsoever. And I’ll state this: If they come back for another four next year, I hope I can sign and do four more Saturday Night’s Main Events next year.”

Ventura played hardball, and WWE caved, securing him for four shows instead of just one. It’s a classic move from The Body, who has never been shy about negotiating for what he believes he deserves.

Now that he’s locked in for Saturday Night’s Main Event, Ventura is enjoying his return—but he’s also trying to bring back a little old-school heel energy. The only problem? Fans won’t boo him, no matter what he says.

“I’ve been going to these events trying to get booed, and I get there and there’s nothing I can do.”

In Ventura’s prime, good guys and bad guys were clearly defined, but he believes today’s wrestling landscape is different.

“What I say in wrestling today to my day, I don’t see the villain-good guy as much today. I don’t see that. I see you are all a bunch of characters. Each wrestler’s a character and it all just depends whether the fans like this character right now or like that character. Where in my day, it was much more the lines were drawn, and I think the lines were drawn more clearly in the old days than they are so today.”

Still, Ventura is determined to figure out a way to get under the crowd’s skin—even if it means pulling a Hulk Hogan stunt.

“I was screaming at the fans the other day, ‘You think I like you people now?’ They’re all, ‘We don’t care, we don’t care.’ I’m going crazy at the events because I’m trying to get ‘em to hate me. I guess the only way to do that is to wrap myself up in the American flag and come out and call myself the Hulk and I’ll get booed off the stage.”

Ventura played his cards right, and WWE had no problem meeting his demands. Now that he’s back, will he stick around for even more Saturday Night’s Main Event episodes next year? Drop your thoughts below!