Please keep this page to Trivia about Batista's wrestling career. Trivia tropes about his acting career and other entertainment ventures are for his creator page.
Creative Differences: Batista claims that one factor that made his 2014 return so disappointing involved the WWE giving him storylines he didn't feel confident in (e.g., debuting as a Face and later making a Face–Heel Turn when it clearly didn't work instead of just acting like a Heel to begin with). While he had no problem in doing things such as being the one submitted by Daniel Bryan and being part of two losses against The Shield with Evolution, he and many fans agreed that not having him return as the obvious conquering hero would have spared all parties involved some pretty terrible stuff like the Royal Rumble fiasco.
His first WWE stint as "Deacon Batista", the sidekick of Reverend D-Von (a.k.a. D-Von Dudley).
And his OVW run as "Leviathan".
Creator's Apathy: He confessed in the WWE 24 episode Batista: Dream Chaser that when he returned to WWE in 2014, he didn't try to get back into shape or catch up with the storylines.
Dear Negative Reader: Dave has a ton of issues with the internet wrestling community and their chosen one, Daniel Bryan. He didn't take it kindly when fans jeered at him for beating Bryan at the Royal Rumble, mocking the "YES!" chant with his middle fingers and calling Bryan a "broken-down ex-body builder" on Twitter. He did the same thing to AJ Styles back in 2006, claiming that he isn't a real wrestler. (AJ's rebuttal was something along the lines of "that's funny coming from the guy who tears a muscle taking an arm drag.")
His first World Title run was supposed to end twice, long before it did.
First, it would have ended at the hands of Muhammad Hassan. Hassan being banned from UPN after the London Bombing scandal prevented this.
It was then supposed to end in November 2005, in a triple threat match involving Randy Orton and Eddie Guerrero, which did not air due to the latter's sudden passing. Reports vary on who was meant to go over; some say Orton would've won and entered Survivor Series as the World Heavyweight Champion, while others (including a well-publicized quote from Stephanie McMahon) state Eddie would've taken it instead, although Batista himself has gone on the record against this last part.
Batista's gimmick was originally supposed to be that he was angry all of the time because he was a Child by Rape. Thankfully Evolution happened instead.
He was supposed to squash Daniel Bryan in a Beat the Clock match, but he vetoed that as he was aware of how good Bryan is as a wrestler.
During his final run with WWE, he and Triple H both pitched for their ultimate showdown at WrestleMania 35 to be a Hell in a Cell match, to give the rivalry the level of hate-fueled violence they felt it deservednote Batista was upfront about the fact that both he and Trips were older part-time wrestlers and needed as much violence as possible to cover any possible ring rust but Vince nixed it because he wanted to restrict HiaC matches to the named PPV for marketing purposes, so they made do with a No Holds Barred match that still delivered impressively.
Batista was supposed to be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame class of 2020 (with the ceremony pushed back to 2021 due to the COVID-19 Pandemic), but due to prior obligations, he was removed from the class to be inducted at a later date.
