Impact and indie star Rhino has revealed WWE wanted to have him dye his hair blonde and take up the name "Mary" shortly after his ECW run.
The 44-year-old, who turned down a lucrative deal to remain with WWE last year because he wanted to wrestle more often, spoke to AEW World Champion Chris Jericho on his Talk is Jericho podcast recently.
He said the promotion wanted to make their own character for him and, because they couldn't patent his name, they somehow thought Mary the perfect name for him to wrestle under.
“They wanted to change my name to Mary," he said. "This was after ECW. They were like, ‘We gotta change your name.’ And I go, ‘Why?’ They go, ‘We can’t patent it.’ [Joe Legend] said, ‘Why don’t they just change [the I] to a Y?’ I think they just wanted to create their own character for me.
"Edge goes, ‘You guys are going to drop the ball. Bring him in as our friend and heater.’ They wanted to dye my hair blonde and make me their little brother. Can you imagine having to dye your hair blonde all the time? They were kicking around different ideas. Juggernaut was one. The worst one was Mary. I don’t know where it came from.”
Mary!?
Rhino was offered around double his salary to remain on the WWE roster but he didn't want to be sitting at home receiving cheques. He returned to Impact Wrestling, having fought at TNA before his second stint with WWE. He's also wrestling on the indie scene.
We don't imagine he would have gotten by with a name like Mary and how that's the best WWE could have come up with is quite puzzling.
Maybe he had a little lamb we're yet to find out about?