Bully Ray Says Divisive WWE Storyline Resulted In His Biggest Payday

Before building on their tag team as the Dudley Boyz in WWE, Bubba Ray (Bully Ray) and D-Von were first paired together in ECW, bringing that hardcore style into WWE after their debut. However, when the WCW Invasion angle happened, despite establishing themselves in WWE, The Dudley Boyz were on the side of WCW instead.

"Biggest payoff [in WWE] ever was that Invasion pay-per-view; when it was Five-On-Five. I could not believe – dude, when I saw that cheque, I was like, 'What the Hell?' I couldn't believe it," Bully exclaimed on "Busted Open Radio." However, earlier in the podcast, he said the composition of the invading team wasn't quite up to snuff.

"It was really weird for me and D-Von to be Team Invasion, like WCW/ECW. I believe the original idea was the idea of The Invasion to just be WCW, but – no disrespect to the talent – WWE didn't feel like the WCW talent that were invading was gonna be strong enough."

Bully further opined that ECW specifically had a lot more "fandom" behind it than WCW had by 2001, which he thinks was another reason for the pairing, but even then, he and D-Von weren't quite living in the past.

"Me and D-Von felt really odd because we were WWE guys by then. You know, we had done a lot in WWE. We had (...) The Royal Rumble Tables match, we had a Ladder Match, maybe even one TLC or two TLC by then," he insisted. "It was odd to be on the other side."

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "Busted Open Radio," and provide a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.