The fanfare from social media and in-person reactions extended the pairing’s on-screen lifespan.
At ROH Death Before Dishonor, both Athena and Billie Starkz defended their titles. Athena successfully defended the Women’s World Title while Starkz lost the Women’s World Television Championship to Red Velvet.
Going into the show, Athena made the media rounds and one of her stops was a chat with Stephanie Chase. She shared that originally, the pairing with Starkz was not supposed to be for long but the social media fanfare and in-person reactions extended it. She also praised Lexy Nair for her involvement.
Everyone is so hands-on with M.I.T. and this whole angle and it’s been just beautiful and amazing from the very beginning and I think, like, it was weird because originally, Billie (Starkz) wasn’t gonna be with me for that long. It was supposed to be shorter and then, the crowd got really behind it and then the internet got really behind it and then it became this long-term storytelling that I feel like we were all craving and we were all on board and we just kind of yanked Lexy (Nair) in. I tell her all the time, ‘If you wanna just hit me one day, it’s totally fine because I put so much pressure and so much stress on you’ and she is such a professional. She nails it every single bit of the time because she’s still learning too. She’s an interviewer. She’s not used to being a character but boy, when she turns it on, it’s amazing and I’m just so proud of everything that we built up. I call myself the forever ROH Champion knowing at any moment, a competitor could beat me for the title. But, I’m enjoying this ride, I’m enjoying this historic reign and I’m just enjoying life right now, which I feel like for so long I was missing that.
Athena has been reigning as Women’s World Champion since Final Battle 2022. Her match at Death Before Dishonor was her 23rd defense of the title.
If the quote in this article is used, please credit Stephanie Chase with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcription.
