WWE Hall of Famer Alundra Blayze discusses Ronda Rousey's impact on the women's evolution in WWE.
Blayze wrestled for WWE in the 1990s and won the Women's Championship three times. She left the company in 1995, and it took many years for the company to begin giving women's wrestler's more meaningful opportunities. Through the work of the Bella Twins, Paige, Sasha Banks, AJ Lee, Becky Lynch, Charlotte Flair, and many others, women showed the world that they belonged in the spotlight; Lynch, Flair, and Rousey made history by main-eventing WWE WrestleMania 35. Rousey, a former Women's Bantamweight Championship, joined WWE full-time in 2018 and captured the Raw Women's Championship at SummerSlam that year.
Speaking with Joey Karni on The Angle Podcast, Blayze discussed the progress of women's wrestling and the way it has evolved in recent years. She brought up Rousey and stated that she loves the way the company brought the former UFC star in. Blayze emphasized her belief that Rousey took the women's evolution to a new level, as she added legitimacy and star power to it.
"I really love the fact that Ronda Rousey came in and they hired her. They couldn’t have picked a better person. She put in the work, and she shows up, and she does her job. She knows what it means to train, to put your head in it, to focus, to do whatever. Look at her background. There’s gonna be a lot of people that disagree with me out there, but this is just my opinion, that when they brought in Ronda, everything skyrocketed, it really did. It was becoming to be on the map, you could feel it. But I really feel that it would have took a lot longer without Ronda, or maybe it wouldn’t have turned the page. She escalated it. [She made it] more legit. Like, ‘Oh crap, Ronda Rousey, she’s gonna bust somebody. I gotta watch this.’ Just her name put some legitimacy in there. I think it’s badass. I wish I was younger, and I would love to go toe-to-toe with her. If I was younger, absolutely," Blayze said.
Rousey last appeared on the December 30 episode of WWE SmackDown. There, she defeated Raquel Rodriguez to retain the SmackDown Women's Championship, but she then lost the title to the returning Charlotte Flair in an impromptu title match.
Flair recently discussed her return to WWE. Check out her comments here.
Rousey has teased her interest in taking over the womens's tag team division. Click here to see what she had to say.
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