WaffleAfterHours

Dave Bautista: "I couldn't afford to buy them Christmas presents." He was talking about his two little kids, years before he headlined WrestleMania. In the video below, he says what one Christmas did to him: "I was closing on 30 and I was still broke." So he went to one of the club promoters he worked for and asked to borrow money for his kids' presents. He says he was so embarrassed and so humiliated to have to do it. He was working club doors for $100 a night. He says he wasn't educated or skilled at anything. He was athletic and had "a decent look." So he paid $300, three nights at the door, for an open tryout at WCW's training school in Atlanta. He says that was a lot of money for him then. They told him to leave. In his words: "You're never going to make it." He was heartbroken for about a week. Then he kept going "out of spite." Near 30, a loan for Christmas presents. At 36, the main event of WrestleMania. On April 3, 2005, he beat Triple H at WrestleMania 21 and became world heavyweight champion. The money did not last. By the time Marvel cast him as Drax, he told IGN: "My house was foreclosed, I had nothing, man. I sold all my stuff." He says he also had issues with the IRS. Then Guardians of the Galaxy made $773 million worldwide. He hit bottom twice. He started over twice. Years later, the trainer who sent him home called it "the best thing that ever happened to him." Bautista says he has heard "you can't" so many times that it is now what pushes him.