A Week After Calling Brock Lesnar’s Less Popular Nickname “Terrible”, Vince McMahon Was Forced to Take His Words Back

Brock Lesnar quickly got on the top of the mountain in WWE after his debut. Just a few months into his WWE career, he defeated Dwayne Johnson, aka The Rock for the WWE Championship at SummerSlam. However, while building him as the next major WWE superstar, Vince McMahon had concerns over Paul Heyman‘s first promos on behalf of Lesnar.

When Heyman returned to WWE programming in 2002 and delivered The Beast Incarnate’s first promo, McMahon called it “terrible”. However, the former WWE CEO changed his mind about it in a week.

Vince McMahon was concerned about Paul Heyman calling Brock Lesnar ‘The Next Big Thing’

Shortly after Brock Lesnar debuted, The Rock was moving to Hollywood and Steve Austin had left WWE. Therefore, it gave Heyman the idea to call Lesnar ‘The Next Big Thing’ in WWE and Vince McMahon didn’t like it. 

In a recent appearance on the Tetragrammaton with Rick Rubin podcast, The Wise Man shared his conversation with McMahon. Moreover, he recalled how the 77-year-old changed his mind in a week after initially not liking Heyman’s nickname for Lesnar.

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The 57-year-old said, “Vince turned to me and he goes, ‘What did you call him?’. I said, ‘I called him the Next Big Thing Brock Lesnar’. Vince says, ‘That’s terrible! Why would you call him that?’ I said, ‘Because it’s the Next Big Thing, the technical name. Boy just ticked that on him’ Vince says, ‘Oh god, people are gonna vomit it at all over that’. Thank god by the next week there were signs in the crowd of The Next Big Thing like it had caught on.”

He added, “And people in the production were saying the Next Big Thing, the Next Big Thing. Brock Lesnar said he is the Next Big Thing, JR had written on his notes he is the Next Big Thing and Vince started to realize, ‘Oh you know what, maybe this is more catchy than I thought it was. So he says, ‘I’m gonna give you one more chance to get it over, and don’t screw this up’. I said, ‘I won’t.’”

Clearly, Lesnar was the Next Big Thing and Heyman had predicted early to call him that. WWE saw a huge star in him and his advocate carried The Beast as a star in his first year. He was with The Conqueror when he won the first WWE title, which was a change in his actual plans.

The Rock vs Lesnar was never a thought for SummerSlam

The Beast won the WWE title only 126 days after his debut. He defeated The Rock at SummerSlam to become the youngest WWE Champion. But those were not the plans for Lesnar as per Paul Heyman.

In the same podcast, The Special Counsel revealed WWE planned for Lesnar to win the title at WrestleMania 19 in the main event. However, Heyman’s Next Big Thing worked so pretty well, WWE made him the champion early. This was because The Rock was leaving for Hollywood and Lesnar was perfect to be the next champion.

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