I missed the NFL by an inch. IRS problems... No money coming in, and not that many options left because I signed that stupid no-compete clause with WWE. I had no one to blame but myself.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
To this day, I still haven't touched one dime of my signing bonus or NFL contract money. I live off my marketing money and haven't blown it on any big-money expensive cars, expensive jewelry, or tattoos and still wear my favorite pair of jeans from high school.
I'm a professional wrestler at heart, and I miss it.
I made good money at WWE and traveled the world and interacted with my fans, but I missed a lot of family time. That really hits me.
I certainly would have regretted not getting into wrestling. It's been very lucrative for me and I've been fortunate to get into it and make money and not do anything stupid where I invested in something that collapsed.
That's one of the reasons why I left WWE: not to feel tied up or pressured into fulfilling a certain number of work dates throughout the week or month - because of my injuries.
I'm glad that I just played baseball, because I'm sure I had a much longer baseball career than I would've had a football career. I did miss football, but I didn't miss some of the injuries from football.
My main reason for leaving WWE was to heal up my body - to give it a rest - and to spend time with my wife and my kids.
Back in 2004, Vince McMahon basically told me to consider WWE to be my playground, and that I could come and play any time I wanted to.
I had a great run with WWE. WWE gave me great visibility. I met my wife there, and I got paid a lot of money; it was just my time to go. I sensed it. I was smart enough to leave. That's the bottom line.
I had a great time in the NFL. To make it in the amount of time that I did was awesome; it's a dream come true, and hell, it gave me the opportunity to go wrestle.