Deonna Purrazzo dives into her Knockouts World Title reigns.
Several months into Deonna Purrazzo’s return to IMPACT Wrestling in 2020, she became Knockouts World Champion. After losing the title at Bound For Glory that year, Purrazzo won it back weeks later and went on to have a year-plus reign as champion.
She dove into that title reign while on Refin’ It Up with Brian Hebner. Purrazzo stated that her second title reign was not supposed to last as long as it did. She mentioned that at Slammiversary 2021, she was not originally supposed to face Thunder Rosa and was going to wrestle someone else.
Purrazzo went on to add that one of the reasons she held onto the Knockouts World Title was she had a double title match set for Triplemanía and was already advertised for it although she was fine with dropping the title beforehand.
I wasn’t supposed to have it [Knockouts World Title] as long as I did for sure. But you know, things happen and you have to roll with the punches and figure it out but I think that, I don’t know, in my opinion, it’s easier to have a heel champion and to have a babyface on the chase. So I think it just makes for more drama and it makes it more interesting and I feel like heels have better, long runs and for me, it was constantly trying to like, okay, so ‘The Virtuosa’ won it, that’s my reintroduction. Now I lose it to Su [Yung] at Bound For Glory 2020 but I win it back in a No-DQ match. The Fujiwara Armbar wouldn’t make Su Yung, this demon person tap out so I need a new finish, there came the piledriver in a No-DQ match which no one’s really seen me do before. So how do you constantly up your game and reinvent yourself and show new sides of you? And I think that’s what makes it the most interesting but these long title runs, they don’t get boring.
Bound For Glory, Kylie [Rae] got hurt. My surprise opponent was Su, so I did lose and then yeah, they had me win it back three or four weeks later in a No-DQ match and then there was supposed to be one other time right before Slammiversary I believe, 2021 where I ended up wrestling Thunder Rosa that I was maybe gonna lose but then I was doing stuff with AAA and there was like, I don’t know, whether it was a miscommunication or what it was but, my AAA match for Triplemanía became a title versus title match and then so I couldn’t lose because I had already said I would put the title on the line and so I went to them with like, ‘I’m so down to do whatever you need and if I’m not the champion, that’s so fine but like, whoever is the champion needs to go to Triplemanía and not me,’ you know what I mean? And that way, the Knockouts Championship is still defended, it’s still title versus title but now there’s other implications and other things involved that are bigger than just this one match, right? So then I ended up keeping it. They didn’t know what my match at Slam was supposed to be because I was supposed to wrestle somebody else, then they had to leave, it was a whole thing. So, that mystery opponent was really — I didn’t know until a couple days before who I was wrestling, and yeah, Mickie [James] got released and it all kind of just fell into place but yeah, there was those two times I was supposed to lose and then things happened and then I was maybe gonna lose and then maybe not and no one could really figure it out but there was so many outside forces happening that just had me hold onto it way longer.
I am such a believer in everything happens for a reason in fate and absolutely, I think that I needed it for my confidence and I don’t know what the universe was giving me but they gave me everything I needed [Purrazzo laughed]… It was so cool, so cool.
Purrazzo and Chelsea Green had been in possession of the Knockouts World Tag Team Championships until they lost the belts to Jessicka and Taya Valkyrie at Bound For Glory. To get a recap of that show, click here.
If the quote in this article are used, please credit Refin’ It Up with Brian Hebner with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcription.
