The Rock became a long-time fan of the UFC after watching the franchise's first ever event in 1993 while playing college football for the University of Miami. However with the possibility of a career in the NFL on the line, and the opportunity to follow in his father's footsteps in professional wrestling, his love of MMA remained channelled only as a fan rather than a potential athlete.
The thought of the 196cm, 118kg Rock in a sport that gives you permission to hurt your opponent by almost any means possible is truly terrifying. Luckily for the rest of the UFC's heavyweight division, it appeared Johnson had left it too late.
"In my head, I felt like it was at least a two-year process for me to even get in the (cage), let alone the UFC," he said.
"I wasn't quite too sure what to do or what kind of people to put around me at the time, so the idea kind of fizzled out and I continued to stay on the path of movie making."
Missing out on his window to make it in Dana White's organisation hasn't exactly stunted Johnson's career.
As the current highest-grossing actor in Hollywood, he still makes sporadic appearances in the WWE, and has had hit after hit on the big screen. In the next 12 months alone, he'll star alongside Kevin Hart in Central Intelligence, Vin Diesel in Fast 8 and Zac Efron in Baywatch.
Johnson said he still closely follows the UFC, and considers MMA the most challenging sport in the world.
"Anybody, by the way, who is successful in one area and then commits to MMA, I just feel like it's the toughest f***ing sport in the world," Johnson said. "I always take my hat off to those guys."
"Still a big fan and love the sport," Johnson added. "But at one time, I did consider it."
