– We’re live backstage from WWE RAW in Dallas as Steve Austin welcomes us. He talks about making his debut here in pro wrestling and says they can call it sports entertainment now if they want. He gives Brock Lesnar props and introduces him. They thank each other and Austin plugs the WWE Hell In a Cell math with The Undertaker. Austin says he wants to have fun tonight.

Lesnar says he’s not arrogant or cocky on purpose, it’s just how he was built. As a kid, he was the kid beating up other kids on the playground. He’s always had a chip n his shoulder and still does. That’s just his attitude. Austin asks how growing up on a farm made him who he is today. Lesnar says with life on the farm where he grew up, they didn’t have a lot of extra money. Income was based on how well cows produced milk and fields produced grain. He says when some years are better than others, you get used to living like you’re broke and they were broke. He talks about how hard the dairy farming work was and he applied that to his amateur wrestling.

They talk about arranging a hunting trip together in the near future. Austin asked about trucks and Lesnar says he’s a Dodge guy. He talks about he and his father owning Mopars. He drives a Dodge Ram right now but it’s not all done up. Austin shows a photo of a black 1978 Dodge power wagon that Lesnar calls his million dollar project he’s been working on. They talk about their favorite brands for hunting equipment. Austin says he’s a big fan of food and asks Lesnar what his favorite is. Lesnar say steak and he’s always on the grill. He likes to grill a steak, have a cold beer or a cold rye whiskey and look out over his land, not seeing his neighbors. Austin says he’s a gas guy but Lesnar grills with charcoal. His favorite beer is Coors Light. Austin says he wanted people to get in the mind of Lesnar here. Austin asks Lesnar’s music of choice and he says he’s a hardcore country guy. His all-time favorites would be David Allen Coe, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Johnny Cash. He also likes Metallica, Motley Crue and AC/DC. He says he likes hearing young guys come up in the country world now. He names Colter Wall, who just did a Hell In a Cell video on Paul Heyman’s Heyman Hustle YouTube channel. Lesnar sent Austin a link to Colter and Austin agrees he’s good. Austin wants to get to the real questions now.

Austin asks if Lesnar is a pro wrestler or a sports entertainer. Lesnar says that’s a good question and asks if there’s a difference. He says he’s in the entertainment industry, they sell tickets and put asses in seats. At the end of the day, everyone goes to college and wants to make a living and have fun, then it’s not work. Lesnar says he just took a different path. He thanks God every day how he’s been fortunate. He never watched wrestling growing up, he watched Little House on the Prairie. Lesnar curses and it’s edited out on the 7-second delay. Lesnar says he had two channels on TV growing up and they worked part-time. He talks about playing football in school and says he had no wrestling offers coming out of school, which surprises Austin. He talks about getting cut from the Minnesota Vikings and knowing he wasn’t going to make it past training camp but he didn’t give up because that’s not how his mother raised him. Lesnar says he gets humbled every day. If it’s not his kids, it’s something he’s doing like hunting. He learned at a young age, he was humbled a lot on the farm and has to respect that. The most important thing is not quitting. Lesnar gives props to NFL players and says the camp was one of the hardest thing he’s ever done. He talks about wrestling in school and getting into the University of Minnesota but not graduating. He says he fell into a rut and quit school when he won the NCAA title. He spent almost two months in the basement of the home he was renting and fell into some depression. He says WWE had interest in him and he had the chance to try out with a few NFL teams. He had nothing to his name and no money. He woke up every day and worked out because that made him feel good. He says he just hibernated for two months until his room mate got him out of the house. He started thinking about a game plan – train for the Olympics, go to WWE or try out for the NFL. He wanted to get off the farm so bad when he was 16 or 17 that he went off to boot camp for the National Guard. Austin asks how he ended up in OVW.

Lesnar says the University wanted to protect him from pro wrestling. Austin shows a photo of a young Lesnar, Randy Orton, John Cena and Batista from their OVW days. Lesnar says he knew Shelton Benjamin from college and moved in with him. He was blown away, in a good way, by the training facility because it was barbaric. He say it reminded him of growing up in barbaric South Dakota. He loved the OVW facility. Lesnar talks about signing with WWE the first time and how Jim Ross was the one he was dealing with. He had some prior commitments at wrestling camps that he had to keep and says maybe it showed that he was a man of his word. He talks about hooking up with Brad Rheingans, who introduced him to “Mr. Perfect” Curt Hennig and others. They took him under their wing. He was somewhat of a “Minnesota boy.” Austin says when he first saw Lesnar get called to the main roster he thought Lesnar had a helluva look and would have a future. Austin says Hennig and “Big Bossman” Ray Traylor took an instant liking to him. Lesnar talks about traveling with them and learning in the car. Austin agrees the car is the best time to learn. He also rode with Kane and The Undertaker a few times, offering to ride in the back and pump gas for them. Austin credits these guys with helping him with psychology and putting a match together. Having them in his ear and smartening him up to things helped. Austin brings up Lesnar being in the ring with The Rock just a short time after coming up.

Lesnar talks about his first main event against The Rock and Triple H and how they left him out of the loop on purpose so he would learn. They say it’s sink or swim out there. Lesnar gives props The Rock, saying he taught him to be selfish and watch his own back. Rock taught him that if you want to be successful in this business you have to be selfish. Lesnar say it’s give & take but sometimes you have to take, like when he won the title from Rock. Lesnar says he’s not that different than he is on TV, he really doesn’t like people. Austin asks him to elaborate and he says he just doesn’t like being around a lot of people. He can go out in the ring because he feels like he’s in a dome and protected but he doesn’t do well out in public. It’s not a phobia, he just doesn’t play well with others. That’s why he lives in the middle of nowhere and has an 8 foot fence around his property. Austin asks about the botched Shooting Star Press against Kurt Angle at WrestleMania and shows us a clip. They both agree Lesnar is lucky. Lesnar calls that a moment in his career where he failed to take advice from veterans. He wasn’t being selfish and was talked into doing the move. He wasn’t comfortable and won’t say who talked him into doing it. He had done it before but should not have done it. He says someone was telling him it would be a WrestleMania moment. Austin say he was concerned but mad at Lesnar because he didn’t need to do the move. Austin brings up the WrestleMania match with Bill Goldberg. Lesnar admits neither of the wanted to be there. Lesnar days he didn’t want to be there because he didn’t give a shit. Austin shows Lesnar flipping the fans the middle finger. Lesnar says that was to Vince McMahon, not the fans. Lesnar says he had enough of the business just a few years in. He felt trapped and didn’t like who he was becoming. He didn’t like the travel and everything else. He had times he felt like jumping out of the airplane. He was just telling Vince how he’s built to be in the ring, not get to and from the ring. Austin asks if Lesnar sued WWE or if WWE sued him. Lesnar laughs some and asks if it really matters. He says he left the company and it’s water under the bridge. Austin says now he’s back. Austin asks if there has been any dissension in the locker room over Lesnar coming and going. Austin asks if he makes an effort to hang out with the boys. Lesnar says no but he doesn’t know anyone here. He clocks in and clocks out, what’s wrong with that? It’s a job and Austin respects that. Austin brings up MMA now.

Lesnar talks about going from New Japan Pro Wrestling to MMA. At first, Dana White wasn’t accepting his calls. Lesnar talks about planning to attend a Gabriel Gonzaga vs. Randy Couture fight. He bought his own seats, watched as a spectator but jumped the barrier and introduced himself to Dana after the fights were over. Dana then pulled him back and they had a meeting, Dana took him seriously. Lesnar says they didn’t talk money just yet. Lesnar told Dana to sign him to a one-fight deal and if he can’t sell pay-per-views, don’t have him back. He talks about the first fight against Frank Mir. He figured after that loss Dana wouldn’t have him back but he saw Dana backstage after the fight and he was thrilled, saying how awesome it was. Dana told him that night his UFC career wasn’t over. He then signed a three-fight deal. They talk about the next fight against Heath Herring and say he hasn’t been the same since. Everything was fine until Herring made some negative comments backstage before the match, about showing Lesnar how MMA is real, and that lit a fire in Lesnar. Austin talks about the fight against Randy Couture. Lesnar talks about how Dana and the Fertitta brothers used the fight to get Couture back, who had left with the belt. He says the heavyweight division was a little weak then and they needed to get the title on someone new. He talk about the battle against diverticulitis and says he doesn’t know if he would be alive now if he didn’t get sick. The doctor told him he was going to try and save Lesnar’s fight career but if he had to save his life above that, he would. They both agreed you have to respect that. Austin asks about the WWE return after hanging up the MMA gloves. Austin asks how he mended that fence that was so broken with Vince. Lesnar brings up Austin walking out as well. Lesnar says it didn’t offend him. Lesnar says all he knows is Austin didn’t want to do the job for him. Austin wonders why didn’t they main event down the road when Lesnar was ready. It doesn’t make a difference to Lesnar. Lesnar says he has to thank both Dana and Vince for putting a lot of money in his bank account. Lesnar agrees it’s hard-earned money and says he fought for it. He talk about how good UFC was with him. Austin asks if it was straight up business like that when he recently re-signed with WWE. Lesnar says he was not bluffing when he talked about going back to UFC. Lesnar says he felt robbed by diverticulitis and it took him a few years to kick out of it. He started a training camp and told WWE he was really considering a UFC return.

Austin enjoyed Lesnar’s UFC promos and asks about not talking much in WWE. Lesnar says he has to “feed the Jew” and they talk about Paul Heyman. Lesnar says he might not be who he is today without Heyman speaking for him. He says he doesn’t have to talk because his actions speak very loud. Austin agrees. He says being interviewed by Joe Rogan after a fight is different than a wrestling promo. Austin asks about competition and the landscape in WWE right now. Austin asks if he calls the wrestlers his friends or his boys. He asks how competitive the environment is in WWE now, where does Lesnar see himself at today. Lesnar says he’s not involved with everyone these days, he’s more hands-on with Vince. He wants to know his role early on, Vince’s thoughts and where Vince wants him. He doesn’t have to do the politicking and make friends with people. He just wants to come and go. If he doesn’t like something, can he dispute it or put his spin on it and if not, that’s fine because he works for Vince. Austin asks what ending The Streak meant to him. As a business man, Lesnar knew it was big. Lesnar says it was almost as big as him winning the WWE Title and he knew that. He gets a lot of criticism for it but wonders who else in the industry has enough credibility to end The Streak. He doesn’t think there is anyone else and Austin agrees. Austin asks what he thinks is the biggest misconception on Lesnar in people’s minds. Lesnar doesn’t care, he’s never been the type to worry what people think. At the end of the day, he tries to be nice to people unless they cross a line. He just likes to do his own thing. Austin asks how much gas he has left in the tank. Lesnar has a pretty good idea where this is all going to go and laughs. He doesn’t want to share it with anyone but he’s having fun and doing business. He says people fight to get into this business. He says leaving the business probably made he and WWE more money, because he went out and made a name for himself, piggybacking the WWE label. He says he and WWE helped each other out and he’s here for a few more years. He would tell a young Lesnar to make sure this is what he wants to do and make sure he understands the circumstances. He says people think this generation expects everything to be handed to them and doesn’t want to work for anything. He says if you don’t work, you won’t have anything. Austin agrees. They talk about Hell In a Cell and Lesnar says there will be lots of carnage. He’s coming to hurt The Undertaker and is getting a little annoyed by him. Austin says he respects both men, thanks Lesnar and that’s it from Dallas.