Titus O’Neil spoke with The Miami Herald about his friendship with Batista, who joined him at the Navy UDT-SEAL Museum’s 30th Annual Muster and Music Festival Weekend.
He said: “Once the Navy SEALs asked me to do it, I shared that great news with people who are close to me, and Dave [Batista] immediately text me back and said, ‘When is it?’ He was also there for me in Chicago when I got the humanitarian award from Jesse Jackson [at The Rainbow PUSH Sports Awards in 2014]. He always wants to be there for me in big moments. Same with me. I always want to be there when he’s doing movie premieres and stuff like that. He’d been on a whirlwind media tour. He literally got home late that Friday night and came over that Saturday morning early. He got home in Tampa, and then a buddy of mine drove him over, so he could rest and sleep in the car. He just came from promoting 007 [the James Bond film] ‘Spectre.’ [Batista plays villain Mr. Hinx.] He’d been overseas, everywhere. So for him to be there for me. He is one of the closest friends that I have. He’s like a brother to me, a big brother to me, and he always has been, even before I got into WWE. I was very proud to have him there, and a lot of people were very excited about having him there, too.”
