Another wrestler who is notorious for having heat with his colleagues is one-half of the most decorated tag team in pro-wrestling history. Budda Dudley - or Bully Ray during his TNA years - is the more brash, outspoken and abrasive member of the "brother" tandem and has his fair share of detractors, Batista chief among them. According to Bubba himself, the bad blood stems from a tag match featuring The Dudley Boyz vs. Randy Orton and Batista where both members of Evoluton suffered injuries, as did Bubba. Both men blamed Bubba and there's been beef ever since. In this excerpt from his autobiography Batista Unleashed, he had this to say about Bubba:
"The match continued for a while, and it was just a nightmare. When it ended, they hauled Randy out in an ambulance. I followed in a car. Even Bubba Dudley got hurt, injuring his back. Or so he claimed. See, the thing that really, really drives me crazy about that night was that Bubba Dudley b*tched out Randy while he was being put into the ambulance. Bubba started yelling at Randy, claiming that because of landing on Randy's foot, he had hurt his back. Excuse me? Because Bubba broke Randy's foot by landing on it and crushing it, Bubba's back hurt and it was Randy's fault. Yeah, that's it. Randy's in the ambulance with a broken foot and Bubba's screaming and yelling at him. And you know, usually if somebody gets injured in your match, or even if it's just a guy you work with, at some point you try to give him a call to check on him and see how he's doing. You want to show a little bit of concern. He's a coworker, and whether you were responsible or not, it's just a polite thing to do. The right thing to do. Show you care. Needless to say, Bubba never gave me or Randy a call just to see how we were doing. Nothing. In my opinion, Bubba Dudley is a jerk-off. He's one of those people who used to always bully guys and throw his weight around just because he had a good position in the company. He'd been around for a long time and he was one of those veterans who'd always treated the rookies like sh*t. He treated me like sh*t. He treated Randy like sh*t. To this day, I can't forgive him. I don't have a whole lot of bad things to say about people, but Bubba Dudley will always be a piece of sh*t in my book."
Both men seem to have softened as the years have passed so let's hope they've managed to mend fences a bit.
Brad Hamilton is a writer, musician and marketer/social media manager from Atlanta, Georgia. He's an undefeated freestyle rap battle champion, spends too little time being productive and defines himself as the literary version of Brock Lesnar.
