Bill Goldberg embraced using his surname as his ring name because he wanted to give fans a Jewish sports figure they could be proud of.
During an appearance on Talk Is Jericho, Goldberg spoke about how he ended up using his real name as his professional name. Originally called “Bill Gold”, Goldberg also pitched calling himself “The Hybrid” in WCW. Jericho pointed out that ‘Goldberg’ is such a monumental and powerful name in wrestling now, but it wasn’t always the case.
“I put up a smokescreen, man. [laughs] The main reason I did it was because I am proud of who I am. I am proud of my Jewish heritage and growing up in Tulsa, Oklahoma where there weren’t many prominent Jewish sports figures walking around — let alone in the national spotlight — I just wanted to give little kids something to look forward to. Something against the grain, something different than the norm. I wore it on my heart like a shield and I’m extremely proud of the decision I made.”
When he first came in, Goldberg also says he wasn’t exactly warmly accepted in the locker room. He said that part of it might have been his own doing, but he always felt like he had to keep his guard up.
“You’re hilarious because you could answer all of these questions, you were there. [laughs] You’re just teeing me up. The best analogy I could give you is that I was like a college football player walking into a frat party. Nobody wanted me there, at least that’s how I felt. At the end of the day, football is a ‘big team, little me’ sport, and that’s all I ever knew. Wrestling is a business and whether you see people coming in as attributes to your roster or you see them as detriments to your career, they are taking a spot of yours,” Goldberg explained. “There are a lot of things that are held back. There are a lot of attitudes that are put forth and I felt like my back was always up against a wall. Maybe because I did that to myself a lot of times, but I don’t think everybody was very happy that I was there.”
Goldberg’s last match was against Roman Reigns at the Elimination Chamber event in February, but he recently revealed that he’s still under WWE contract.
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