Rob Van Dam talks about why he left TNA and why went back to WWE with Chris Jericho

Rob Van Dam was a guest on Chris Jericho's podcast titled "Talk is Jericho" recently and talked about a number of topics.

Here are some highlights from the interview.

On his most recent run in the WWE:

"It was awesome. I really enjoyed it. I was impressed with the work rate standard and how much higher it was than when I left. When I was there before there was room for guys that sucked. Guys that would get pushed, fans would b****, we would b****, some of us would have to put them over, then they realized that doesn't work and they get rid of them. Then we're left with broken pieces to pick up. I don't want to start naming names, but there were several. There was just room for that then. Now there's not. Everybody knew what they were doing in that ring on a whole new level and I was really and happy to see that. I hope that trickles down everywhere."

On his departure from TNA Wrestling:

"What happened was that I had a three-year contract with TNA, so the contract was coming up. I was letting it come up without talking to them. Not because I wanted to go anywhere else, but because my pay and my deal was such that I had a number of matches that I would work in a year. If I worked over that then they had to pay me over that. I was collecting overtime and I didn't want to bring it to a point where they would stop booking me because I was still enjoying and collecting the extra [money]. So I let my deal run out and I was still working and then boom it ran out."

"I get a phone call. They want to know if I want to re-sign. We talked about every single term. I had a deal on the table that I was really happy with. I was really with the deal that I had when I was there and this was a good thing. I was looking forward to it, but the only thing we didn't have was a starting date and then they just started slacking, saying they were going to call me on Friday and then I wouldn't hear from them. Then, a week or two would go by and I would get a call saying, 'I don't know what's taking them so long. It's not me. It's this person. Let me get back to you.' And I got to a point where I was offended. It struck my ego. So I was just like, 'Well, screw them!'"

On landing another deal with WWE:

"I went to the Hall of Fame to see Booker T get inducted and I knew that would kick a bunch of rumors out there that I'd be coming back, but that wasn't the situation at all. I hadn't seen hardly anybody in years and I got there so late I didn't even get to talk to most people. Right when I got there, there were like, 'We need to rush you out there to the seats.' I was got a couple pictures real quick and they got out on there on the Internet, but I really didn't get to see anybody. It was a little time later that I was like, 'I'm not sure if this thing is happening with TNA,' and there seemed to be plenty of reasons to maybe look into WWE and see if there's an opportunity there."

Van Dam also talked about why he went to TNA, how he got into the business and what it was like to work for Extreme Championship Wrestling. You can listen to the full interview HERE.