Mustafa Ali recalls Royal Rumble spot with Nia Jax.
The Men's Royal Rumble match in 2019 was a wild one, mainly due to the fact that Nia Jax entered the match at the #30 spot after destroying R-Truth on the entrance ramp.
Jax didn't do that well in the bout, as she onle eliminated one wrestler -- Mustafa Ali. Moments later, Randy Orton, Rey Mysterio, and Dolph Ziggler all teamed up to dump Jax from the match.
While speaking with Chris Van Vliet for a new interview, Mustafa Ali recalled being elininated by Jax and said that spot was originally meant for someone who wasn't okay with getting eliminated by a woman.
"So that spot wasn't originally for me. I don't know who it was for, but someone was not very much okay with getting eliminated by a woman. And I'm at this point where I'm trying to prove that I'm a pro’s pro. I'm down for whatever. And I can kind of see, I think it was Jamie Noble, because it was some sort of frantic search. I looked at Jamie. I was like, 'What's the spot?' He looked at me and he goes, 'Would you be okay with it?' I just go, Yep. What is it? He goes, 'Well, Nia is gonna beat up R-Truth, and then she's gonna take everyone's finisher. But before she does that I just need her to throw somebody [out].' I don't know who the original person is. I really don't know. But I remember going it’s a scripted show.
Ali then recalled Jax being relieved that he volunteered to do the spot in place of the unknown wrestler that refused it.
"It's fine. Me and Nia are homies. So I remember I told Nia hey, I'll do it. And she was so like, thank you. I could see the sense of relief. So I could see why some people were like, oh, man, that made you look weak. I go Nia is shoot strong as hell and could pick up anyone in this room right now, and she tossed me over. So we did the thing, hey, Nia, can I do the whole [thing] I'm not gonna hit you. I did this thing and then she head-butted me, picked me up. Gets talked about to this day. Actually, I think the RKO and the 619 she took in the Royal Rumble gets talked more. But yeah, it was a moment. I could see how some of the guys were like, Oh, I wouldn't have done that. One, I didn't have a problem with it. And two, I was looking like, I think that goes a long way to Vince and to Bruce. This guy didn't have a problem getting the spot over because that's a moment. That's what we want to do. We want to create moments. That was the honest intention behind it. So, yeah, it wasn't originally designed for me, from what I understand."
Elsewhere in the interview, Ali recalled Vince McMahon telling him that he wasn't going to win the Money In The Bank match in 2019. Check out his full comments by clicking here.
Ali is currently a free agent in the world of wrestling, as he departed from TNA Wrestling after Slammiversary in July.
Special thanks to Chris Van Vliet and his team for the quote(s).
