An Unchaperoned Conversation With Triple H

Chris Radtke: One of the most interesting stories is your personal trajectory. What's it like working at the corporate offices and having your hands in all the different departments? What's most interesting? What's most challenging?

Triple H: What's most interesting, for me, from a fun stand point, is taking young guys that I see are coming up that maybe have the tools, and maybe helping them use those tools. You know it's unfortunate now that there's really no place else - we're a victim of our own success in a way, there's no place else for guys to go learn to do what we do, and then come work for us. Yeah, they just come and work for us and they're green and they don't get it. They've got the tools, we can teach them to do the moves and stuff, it's the psychology and all the other aspects that go with it, to take a guy that doesn't get it and slowly teach him until he does get it and then see him succeed.

Chris Radtke: Is there someone in particular?

Triple H: Well, like over the last year or two, Sheamus was a guy that I worked with a lot. I saw him come in, and I thought this kid's got something, and became kind of like my pet project and tried to get him rolling. One of the big things about the time in my career was that I took Randy Orton, who was a young guy, and I'm not claiming their success at all, because they had all the tools, but to take Randy Orton whose just a young guy that was kind of floundering, doing nothing, had the tools but didn't know how to use them, and Batista, who was kinda lost really, but had this amazing look, and was hungry for the business.  Rick and I took those guys, we hand picked them out of everybody, and said these are the two guys, we're going to make these two guys. And then a couple years later, I'm wrestling Batista at the main event of WrestleMania, and Randy's one of the youngest WWE champions. To see all that success now and to see where they came from, you know, its very rewarding for me, its cool from a different aspect, and to see that - even to just to be in a show and to help guys put something together and watch them go do it, and see it come out really good, and you're like, "yeah that was great, awesome." Yeah it's that same rush almost like being in the ring, you know? Being in the office and sitting in long boring meetings I can do without, but you got to take the good with the bad, you know?