He wanted to do WWE and PRIDE, figuring his PRIDE fights would give him a legit aura and his WWE work would get his name out. WWE wanted him all to themselves, so he passed on the deal.
Yeah. It would have been similar to Rock's schedule before he left for good. Sapp goes over to PRIDE, does his thing where he is star and comes back to America and is a superstar for WWE.
Instead WWE will probably let Sapp walk into TNA where they would more likely let him work in Japan along with the 3-4 shows per month.
Sapp has this thing where he always says "he doesn't want to be owned by anyone" after what happened with him and K-1. That tells me he'll never work for WWE they essentially own everyone that works for them.