Samoa Joe was recently interviewed on the 102.5 The Bone's Drew Garabo Live out of Tampa Bay, Florida in which he talked about Triple H being instrumental in his WWE signing. 

 According to Samoa Joe, Triple H was instrumental in bringing 'The Samoan Submission Machine' to WWE; however, many people put in a good word.

"Yeah, [Triple H] made the call, so I give him a ton of credit for me being with WWE because he was my contact point. Really, it was a bunch of dudes. It was Paul Heyman; it was Road Dogg; it was Joey Mercury. Really, it was a laundry list of people who were with the company who worked with me throughout my [pro wrestling] career."

Notably, Joe claimed that he was originally offered an NXT deal only and got the main roster deal less than two weeks later.  

"The initial deal on the table, it was a little bit of a low offer, but it was a foot in the door. No, financially, it was actually great, but as far as opportunity, it was a lowball offer. He did take care of me in that aspect, which is much appreciated. He told me from the get that, 'we're probably only going to be used in NXT. You're in your 30s. Vince [McMahon] really isn't interested in bringing those guys up right now.' And that was the edict at the time, 'if you're over this certain age, we're not interested in bringing you to RAW or SmackDown. We're trying to build new talent.' But to me, I already had a pretty good career. It was just kind of an opportunity to stay going. It was a merch deal, which they do so much distribution I was with, and I said, 'yeah, sure.' And within I believe a week-and-a-half, I was offered a main roster contract and continued to work in NXT with later moving onto RAW after we build the brand up."

Listen to the full interview below: