10 Things We Learned From Paul Wight On Talk Is Jericho
9. WWE Offered Him “Double” In 1995
"All business".
That's definitely what the then-WWF were back in 1995 upon seeing WCW's new monster. Wight claims that none other than Jim Ross called him shortly after his match with Hulk Hogan at Halloween Havoc 1995. Vince McMahon's league, rather incredibly, offered to pay The Giant double to ditch WCW and jump to the fed.
Wight admitted to Jericho that he "tried really hard" to get the WWF first, but was rejected on the basis that he hadn't done a lick of wrestling training. That sounds rather odd considering other marketable pet projects who were signed to deals without experience (Mark Henry, for example) weren't told the same.
Giant was still green as grass back in '95 too, so he politely told Ross that he'd like to see out his current contract with WCW and then take things from there. He didn't really understand that he could've used the WWF as leverage against his current employer.
Someone needs to get JR's recollection of this phone call. That'd be interesting.