During a recent appearance on the “The Sessions with Renee Paquette” podcast, former WWE NXT Women’s Champion Mandy Rose commented on her release from WWE, including not having any prior knowledge that her content on FanTime was such a big deal.
You can check out some highlights from the podcast below:
On when WWE first brought their concerns to her attention: “Nobody brought it my attention, besides the night before I lost the title. [I got an email] from my lawyer, and it was just saying ‘take this link down.’ It came from WWE legal. It was just saying to take the link [to my FanTime] down [from my Instagram]. I complied, obviously. Pulled it down that night. The next day was when I lost the title, and got fired the following day. I never had a warning. I know there’s, obviously, a lot of news out there that says I was warned. I never did, but it would have been different, for sure.”
On the emotional response to losing the title to Roxanne Perez: “Everything that I put into the last year and a half, the camaraderie, all the friends that I miss being like… it was really emotional for me that night, when I lost the title. I know I came a long way, and I give myself a lot of credit, but the standing ovation and “Thank you Mandy” chants and everything. It was in NXT, but still. I never thought that I would get this. Just because everything that I went through. It was crazy. I was hugging Shawn and a couple other people after the match. It was very emotional. I had this bad feeling, too, that this is the end. It was bittersweet. There’s always going to be an end for all of us, right? But the way it happened.”
On embracing the transition back to NXT: “I’d always wanted to go a little darker with my hair. I was getting tired of ‘God’s greatest creation, the golden goddess.’ I felt like it just needed a fresh coat of paint, and at the same time, this is a good opportunity for me to practice all of my wrestling skills while also like helping the young people down here, too. That was the biggest part that I took home from it. It was awesome what I did, I’m very grateful and proud of what I did. I’m very humbled because I think I also gave back a lot to the women and men, and not just wrestling. We all know I’m not the greatest wrestler in the world.”
On who she learned from and worked with in NXT: “It was definitely a collaboration. Like I said earlier, Shawn Michaels and I had a great relationship. He kind of saw the talent in me and, while helping Gigi and Jacy at the same time, and turning them not just into me, like me getting a little bit of them. A little bit of edginess. We were all so different but yet we had this cool bond. Johnny Russo, the head writer of NXT. He was my writer when I first went up to RAW with Paige and Sonya for Absolution. So he knows how I would speak, obviously, when it comes to promos. Someone writes you something and you’re like, I don’t say these words, guys. It’s not going to come off natural. He just knew, so my promos felt so much better. Obviously, Sarah Amato with training.”
