How Failed Tim Tebow Pursuit Post-Patriots Impacted WWE President

WWE is no stranger to having athletes on its big shows, and president Nick Khan on Tuesday revealed a potential WrestleMania match involving a former New England Patriots quarterback.

Khan was on the “Pat McAfee Show” to discuss WWE’s new media rights deal for “RAW,” which will see Netflix be the exclusive home for the flagship show starting in 2025. He also discussed Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson joining the board of directors at TKO Group, the publicly traded company that controls UFC and WWE.

The executive also told a story about his involvement with WWE dating his days back as one of the top agents in sports. He revealed how close NFL and wrestling fans got to seeing Tim Tebow against the Big Show.

“Paul Levesque, the ‘King of Kings,’ he’s the one who introduced me to WWE. Hunter, he’s the one who first introduced me,” Khan said. “So when I was an agent, my prior profession, and I was trying to get into the WWE business, Paul had called me, unsolicited call. And this was when Tim Tebow had just gotten cut by the Patriots. Paul called me and said, ‘Hey, I just want to introduce myself. My name is Paul Levesque.’ I said, ‘Oh yeah, Triple H. I know who you are. I remember you as Terra Ryzing.’ He said, ‘Oh, you know WWE?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I know WWE. I was a fan. I was an usher at WrestleMania IX at Caesars Palace. What’s going on?’ He said, ‘What do you think about Tim Tebow against the Big Show’ at whatever that WrestleMania was after the Patriots run.

“I said, ‘What are you thinking.’ He offered some financial terms. I called Tim
at the time. ‘What do you think?’ Tim and I then had a top-secret, private meeting: Tim, myself Vince McMahon and Triple H at Anaheim, Calif. about that. Ultimately, it didn’t happen. …”

Khan continued and said that his relationship with Levesque would lead to the WWE chief content officer recommending him to McMahon as the company’s next president in 2020.

Tebow signed with the Patriots during the 2013 offseason but didn’t make the final roster. Based on Khan’s timeline, the Tebow versus Big Show match would have happened at WrestleMania XXX at Mercedes-Benz Superdome. Instead of a match with Tebow, Big Show wrestled in the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal and was last eliminated by Cesaro.

There have been multiple rumors of a Shaquille O’Neal-Big Show match over the years, but Tebow in the mix against the “World Largest Athlete” certainly would have been the sight to see for the 6-foot-2 quarterback. Why the pair would have feuded is anyone’s guess and might have been why the idea was nixed.

Big Show took on Floyd Mayweather at WrestleMania XXIV, so he’s used to working with celebrities. But the sight of Tebow in the ring might feel like a lost opportunity for NFL fans, especially trying to guess which ex-teammates would have walked him down to the ring.