Another major pro wrestling star is in talks about going into MMA.



Ryback, a 6-foot-2, 290 pound muscular heavyweight, has been in talks with Bellator MMA, although they are not close to a deal.



"Spoke, but nothing close," said Bellator CEO Scott Coker after Ryback, born Ryan Reeves in Las Vegas. Although he recently changed his legal name to Ryback Reeves, he teased the idea of fighting Monday and those close to him have said that he's very interested in the idea.



Ryback, 34, was a WWE regular who left the company over contract issues in May and was officially released in August.



He had intermittent pushes in WWE, including once headlining a successful pay-per-view show against C.M. Punk, although he was not the level of star in wrestling that Punk was. While extremely strong, he doesn't have the amateur wrestling background of Bellator heavyweight and current pro wrestler Bobby Lashley, but is even more muscular than Lashley is nowadays. He was a baseball player in his youth and played at the junior college level before getting into the WWE through the Tough Enough reality show.



He had gotten frustrated in pro wrestling due to not getting as big a push as he felt he deserved.

While having mixed success as fighters, pro wrestlers like Lashley, Brock Lesnar and Punk have all done well as far as drawing television viewers or on pay-per-view. Lashley and Lesnar were both high-level amateur wrestlers, with Lashley winning three NAIA titles and being an Olympic hopeful, and Lesnar winning an NCAA title. Before he became famous in the U.S., Alberto Rodriguez, better known as Alberto Del Rio, posted a 9-5 record in MMA, but he was also a highly rated Greco-Roman style wrestler in his youth.

Ironically, three of the eight finalists from that Tough Enough series in 2004, Daniel Puder, Ryan Mitchell and Justice Smith, dabbled in MMA after leaving pro wrestling.



