The WWE Hall of Famer looks back at the match.
Kicking off WWE’s 2023 Payback Premium Live Event was a Steel Cage match to cap off the program between Becky Lynch and Trish Stratus. The start of their program saw them as teammates heading into WrestleMania 39 and coming out of the event, they competed against one another on multiple occasions.
After their match at Payback, Stratus received praise from the audience in attendance and she took a bow before heading to the backstage area. She looked back at the match during her appearance on GAW TV with Mickie James, Lisa Marie Varon and SoCal Val.
Stratus stated the she was ‘dialed in’ for the Steel Cage match and everything clicked. She compared the program with Lynch to her program with Mickie James as far as fans being with them for a lengthy journey.
I just knew at the end of the day, we (Stratus & Becky Lynch) had to deliver. This was gonna be the end button. This was gonna be it, right? This was gonna sum up all of this work and all of this story and etcetera and we just wanted to kill it and yeah, I would say we did (at Payback). It felt like it, it felt good, and it’s funny because I’ve been back for I guess like six months, right? It’s been since February that I came back and I felt the most dialed in and that is such a great place to be where you’re just like, oh! And you guys know it. When you’re just home and I felt comfortable, I heard the audience, I saw the audience, I felt everything. It just felt so good and dialed in and attributed to the character development and the storyline where we were in the story and what it meant for fans to go on this journey with us and it’s the same thing, WrestleMania 22, right Mickie (James)? It was like we knew (what) that level of engagement was because we took them on this long journey that they were with us for so long… But by the time we got there, they were there and they were ready for what was gonna unfold and so, it felt really good and to get that part, to that point in your career where you get those moments, it’s like a blessing. Of course at this point in my career and in my life, it’s incredible.
She spoke about working with Lynch and heaped praise onto her. Stratus detailed how they formed a friendship over motherhood.
We (Stratus & Becky Lynch) finally got to each other and we got to team with each other which was great to be alongside her. She’s great. So of course you watch a little closer. After we worked together and I sort of watch her a little closer because you get busy with mom life and not being in the world necessarily and then just became a huge fan, watching her closely going, ‘Damn. She’s really something special of this generation.’ You know how we always go, ‘She wrestles like the guys. She does a promo like the guys.’ I don’t know why that’s our benchmark but if we wrestle like a girl, it’s better for some reason although nowadays, saying wrestling like a girl, we should say is freaking awesome because it’s great to wrestle like a girl the way we wrestle like a girl these days, you know? But yeah, she just really delivered and yeah, I bought into the hype too. I’m like, yeah, that would be cool, and so we worked really well together. We had never met before and then we connected when she became pregnant… Just those moments where moms just connect, right? I sent her a, ‘Hey! Congrats’ or, ‘Good luck with the delivery’ and then, oh, breastfeeding and just everything. So we bonded over that, we became good friends outside of wrestling. It was completely removed from wrestling. It was just mama friends which was cool and then yeah, as you know, as you get to work with someone, you become super, super close with them and we got to really explore each other and explore friendships and dig into each other’s brains and we just wanted this to be something — because it got — you know, there’s storylines and things like that but at the end of the day, it’s like this epic generational face-off that you could never have again. You will never have that dynamic. When are you gonna have LeBron (James) and (Michael) Jordan? When are you gonna have Ali-Tyson? It was kind of that, right? So that’s like fantasy matchup stuff that people talk about where they’re like, ‘Oh, this is so cool.’ We have this opportunity and I mean there was definitely Rock-Hogan. There was that. But I can’t recall where there was ever sort of a generational face-off like that… For the women, right? And we just knew it’s a special opportunity to deliver something very unique, a unique dynamic and we didn’t want to lose that. We want you to realize that-that is what the focus is to bring something very, very special to the fans and we worked really well together and I really enjoyed kicking her ass so…
When Stratus made her return to WWE television this year, she did not want to necessarily come back as a babyface. A sticking point for her before officially getting back in the mix was that she wanted to do something different.
I’d been asked if I’d come back and it was sort of a sticking point for me. I was like, honestly, I didn’t necessarily want to come back to baby again. I’ve been baby so many times and it’s fine, but if I was gonna come back, I wanted something different and challenging for me as a performer as well, right? For me to do something that’s gonna stretch my acting chops and whatever. Just stretch the limit and challenge myself. It’s just something different… That was kind of one of my things. If I come back, I’d like to do it this way because yeah, it’s funner. I’ve done that thing already and that’s the whole thing. I always said that too. If I could be challenged, then yeah, I thrive on challenges so, that was fun. It was fun.
In the main event of the 9/12 NXT on USA Network, Becky Lynch bested Tiffany Stratton for the NXT Women’s Championship. The show averaged 850,000 viewers and it was NXT’s largest overall viewing audience since August 2020.
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit GAW TV with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
