Wrestling Facts on Dave Batista

David Michael Bautista, Jr. was born in 1969. Today he's best known as simply Batista, and before he became a world-famous wrestler he was a club bouncer and an aspiring bodybuilder. According to the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) organization, Batista is 6 feet, 6 inches tall and weighs 290 lbs. That puts him in a category with some of the largest wrestlers in America.

Beginnings

Batista's first contact with wrestling came in the mid-1990s when he auditioned at the professional wresting school WCW Power Plant. The trainers there told him that he wasn't cut out to be a wrestler and advised him to abandon the idea. Instead of giving up, Batista decided to try again and was eventually accepted to train at the Wild Samoan Training Center in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Between the years 2000 and 2002, he joined the Ohio Valley Wrestling federation, where he won his first title, the OVW Heavyweight Championship.

WWE Career

Batista became part of the World Wresting Entertainment organization between 2002 and 2010, which is where he won most of his titles. Batista was part of several teams before he moved on to wrestle at Raw live events, WWE SmackDown! and the No-Way-Out 2006 pay-per-view event. Batista's ultimate goal was always to win the World Heavyweight Championshi,p and he ended up getting the title not once but three times. In 2009, he suffered an injury --- a torn left bicep --- that resulted in a four-month hiatus from the ring. He retired in 2010 after several disagreements with the WWE management team.

Victories

A six-time world champion according to the WWE website, some of Batista's most famous titles include being the WWE Champion, the World Heavyweight Champion, the 2005 Royal Rumble winner and a three-time WWE Tag Team Champion.

Miscellaneous Facts

In the ring, Batista was known as "The Animal" or "Evolution's Animal." Batista also created a finishing move called "The Batista Bomb," which has become a signature move in wrestling. The Batista Bomb consists of placing your head between your opponent's legs, then picking him up and slam him against the floor. The move ends with one fighter sitting or falling on top of the other.