Scrapped WWE Character For Drew McIntyre Revealed

Drew McIntyre has a stoic character. He works as ‘The Scottish Psychopath’ who destroys anything and everything that stands in his way.

The gimmick that a superstar uses is extremely important since it defines their career.

When Drew McIntyre was starting his career, he was offered a gimmick that he did not like at all. Thanks to Vince McMahon, he never had to go through with it!

Drew McIntyre was offered the gimmick of a runway model

On No-Contest Wrestling podcast, McIntyre revealed that John Laurinaitis, who was the head of Talent Relations in 2007, had pitched the character of a model and would be called ‘The Runway Man.’

While McIntyre did not like the idea, he didn’t have much of a choice but to accept it. When the idea was presented to Vince McMahon, Drew McIntyre hesitantly agreed, which The Big Man caught on. The idea was scrapped, and he went ahead with ‘The Chosen One’ gimmick.

I remember he pitched to me John Laurinaitis was Head of Talent Relations at the time, and telling me, you know, at Florida Championship Wrestling, which was there prior to NXT, we know today, the original developmental, and he built it up. He built it up. I was listening to him describe the character and thought, ‘Oh no, oh no, oh no.’ And then he went, ‘The name, The Runway Man, you’re going to have your own model runway and you’re going to walk down like a model, and my goodness.’

Like I was picturing in my head, basically all my dreams were going to hell. The life’s worth of a Scotsman signed from Scotland. It was all going down the toilet. The next meeting after Johnny was to go to Vince [McMahon] himself and pitch this idea. And I kind of sat silent, and Johnny pitched it to Vince. And I think Vince saw my face the whole time. And he just said, ‘What do you think?’ And I thought, ‘Whatever you need me to do, I’ll make it work.’

But I had my head down kind of the whole time. And I think he read me like he doesn’t want to do this. And thankfully, they let me play closer to myself. Uh, but I learned years later, it was nowhere close to myself because it took me till I returned to WWE after getting fired, which we’ll probably talk about. Uh, where I finally found myself as a wrestler and as a human.

Currently, Drew McIntyre is booked against Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes for Saturday Night’s Main Event on November 1st, 2025.

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