News

WWE Hall of Famer Speaks Out On Shock TV Return

By John Canton • Published 7th December 2024
WWE Hall Of Famer Remembers Gruesome Injury From Early Match

A WWE Hall of Famer is heading back to the company to reprise a familiar role.

The rumors are true. At the Saturday Night’s Main Event show on December 14th in Long Island, WWE Hall of Famer Jesse “The Body” Ventura will be in attendance.

At WWE SmackDown in Minneapolis, Ventura was shown seated in the front row. Michael Cole informed the audience that Ventura would be on commentary for Saturday Night’s Main Event just like he was for many SNME shows from the mid-1980s into the early 1990s.

In addition to being a WWE Hall of Famer, Jesse Ventura is the former Governor of the state of Minnesota, so he was in a good mood at Smackdown in his home state.

On social media, Ventura addressed his WWE return by thanking Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque, the company, and his son.

That’s right the Governing Body returns to Saturday Night’s Main Event! So excited to get back into the broadcast booth. A very big thank you to @TripleH, @WWE and my son @TyrelWatching for helping make my return a reality.

Jesse Ventura Is Back With WWE Because Vince McMahon Is Gone

The announcer that Jesse Ventura was most known for working with was former WWE Chairman Vince McMahon. A lot of fans loved their banter with Ventura as the heel announcer while McMahon was the play-by-play guy.

Following a scandalous sexual harassment and sex trafficking lawsuit filed by former WWE employee Janel Grant against Vince McMahon, WWE owners TKO Group made McMahon sell his shares in the company. McMahon is no longer involved with the day-to-day operations after spending over 40 years running the company.

Earlier this year when Ventura was interviewed by Chris Van Vliet, Jesse made it clear that he is willing to work with WWE again because McMahon is no longer involved.

“Yeah, very much so. I think that since they merged with the Ultimate Fighting [UFC] and they’re under that one roof now, they’re very much more mainstream corporate that you can deal with better because they’re more open. It isn’t having to tie into the old days of wrestling, for lack of a better term, slavery. Because, you know, in the old days of wrestling, you truly were slaves.

I don’t know, I got a great compliment I heard the other day. Barry Bloom, my former agent, the one I introduced to Vince, I was the first wrestler that made Vince deal with an agent. And I heard Barry was on a podcast and said that all these contracts these guys are getting today, they owe Jesse Ventura a thank you. Because if it weren’t for him, they wouldn’t be getting them.”

One of the big matches at Saturday Night’s Main Event on December 14th will see Kevin Owens challenge Cody Rhodes for the Undisputed WWE Championship at the show taking place in Long Island, NY, and airing on NBC and Peacock.