WSVN-TV entertainment reporter Chris Van Vliet spoke with Mickie James during WWE Royal Rumble weekend. During the interview, she explains why she doesn’t like Becky Lynch’s gimmick as “the man”, she talks about Triple H calling to ask her to return to WWE, being a pioneer of the women’s evolution and her thoughts on AEW providing competition.
Check out the highlights below and scroll down to watch the full interview:
Her recent Twitter feud with Becky Lynch:
“Relax folks, it’s Twitter. Come on! I mean it’s cool, she’s the man. That’s cool. And I’m the woman. I said it there and I’ll say it again, women have always been the dominant sex. So if you want to do this whole ‘I’m the man’ thing which I think went out in 2010, if you want to bring that back, that’s cool. But I’m a woman, I’m a grown ass woman, you know what I mean? And I’m proud of it. I love Becky though, I do respect her. I think she’s fantastic, she amazingly talented. I’m just better.”
She was unexpectedly asked by Triple H to return to WWE:
“Hunter actually called me and it was very unexpected because when I left there I called a couple of times after I left TNA. They called once after I had already started in TNA and I don’t know if they were calling to say ‘Hey, what are you doing do you want to come back. Maybe we overreacted’ or have you learned your lesson kind of thing. But I just told them I’m doing TNA now and they were like ‘Oh, ok.’ But I had friends in WWE would who still call and check up on me and make sure I was doing good. So when I left TNA I thought maybe I’ll call them back and see if they’re even interested and I didn’t hear from them for a while. I went and I had my son and I was totally ok with with that chapter being closed and then that’s when they called me for the Asuka match first. They wanted to see if I would even be interested in that Asuka match. I think the fact that they were calling me showed they were interested and they already knew that I was sorry for any of my bull crap.”
Does she think she will get another title run?
“Yes, I think I should get another title run. At least one. Maybe a title run and a tag title run. I have my tag team partner in Foxy.”
Her thoughts on AEW:
“Competition is amazing. I think everyone achieves higher peaks with that and we all welcome competition. It’s good for the boys, it’s good for my friends who want somewhere else to work and that’s great. But aside from talk, I haven’t really seen anything yet.”
Being a pioneer of the women’s evolution:
“There was a difference between the girls who went out and did gravy bowl matches and granted we were all asked to do some of that stuff but I think even still, the matches that I would have with Beth Phoenix or Trish Stratus they were held at different standards. I don’t think there was ever at any time when the boys in the locker room, at least when I went out there, would say this isn’t going to be a good match. I think they knew because I trained with all guys. There weren’t a whole lot of girls working the independent circuit when I started. There were only a handful of really good girls that you could go out there and work with. So I had to work with most of the guys and train with most of the guys so I learned to work like one of the guys. I didn’t want to be good for a girl, I wanted to be as good if not better than all the guys.”
Thanks to Chris Van Vliet for the transcription.
