Former UFC Champion and WWE talent Ronda Rousey has been quite outspoken about her wrestling career in recent weeks.
Rousey, who has been doing the media rounds ahead of her memoir Our Fight coming out next month, hasn’t shied away from discussing what she disliked about her time in the WWE.
She joined the WWE roster in 2018, competing in four different Wrestlemania matches, and had three different major singles title runs during her time. She wrestled her last match for WWE at last year’s Summerslam, losing an “MMA Rules” performance to Shayna Baszler.
Rousey recently reflected on her time with the promotion in a recent interview with Cageside Seats. She was honest about disliking her time working with Vince McMahon, mentioning frustrations about how women on the roster were treated compared to men.
“I just didn’t wanna be Vince’s action f****** figure anymore,” Rousey told Cageside Seats. “I felt like I was like doing custom matches for a f****** sicko in the back. All power to the girls that keep fighting the good fight. But I’m in my mid-30s now. I’ve got s*** to do.”
McMahon, who left his roles in TKO and WWE earlier this year after a lawsuit emerged that alleged him of sex trafficking, also stepped down during Rousey’s time in the promotion. In that instance, he announced his retirement after The Wall Street Journal reported that he paid $12 million in hush money to numerous women that he allegedly had committed misconduct to.
McMahon’s departure was brief, lasting just six months before he returned to the WWE as a board member. Rousey said that even when McMahon was gone, he was using key figures inside the company to pull the strings for him. In January, she made a social media post that called Bruce Prichard an “avatar” for McMahon. She elaborated on this claim in a recent interview.
“He was never gone while I was there,” said Rousey, on McMahon. “He was just phoning it in through Bruce Prichard. My agent who works at WME, he was telling me, ‘You know, he’s completely gone now, I swear.’ And I’m like, I’ll believe it when I see it because everyone said he left before. He never left. He was there by text message.”
When asked about how WWE runs its women’s wrestling product nowadays, Rousey sounded more positive. The former UFC Bantamweight Champion claimed that she is happy with the changes being implemented by Paul Levesque and that she hoped her time in the promotion took place now, not before.
“I’m so glad that it’s getting turned around,” she said. “Triple H has been great towards the women in the company and really believing in us. He’s the whole reason that I was there, ‘cause he believed in me. I really wish that my last run was under Triple H running things and Vince being gone.” The full Cageside Seats interview also discusses Rousey’s transition from MMA to wrestling, her final matches in the WWE, and her thoughts about the many Wrestlemania appearances she made. You can read the full story here.
