As noted earlier, Ariel Helwani interviewed Mickie James to talk about her upcoming appearance at the WWE Royal Rumble, how the deal came to be, and her thoughts about possible future “forbidden door” opportunities.
James was asked to give her thoughts on WWE releasing so many people over the last couple of years:
“It is head scratching, but then also they’ve had an immense amount of hirings through the years so the company had expanded when it’s gone on the road because it had almost like a whole division of just NXT and WWE and then obviously, the pandemic has I think crushed everyone especially live events and touring and all of those things and I don’t know…it sucks. It sucks for my friends. It sucks for my friends to not have a place to work and now that there’s you know seems to be competition like now they have somewhere to go but then Ring of Honor is kind of shut down behind it. So it’s just like all these things but I don’t know, I feel like the business is ever-evolving. And it always goes through highs and lows, it goes through those things, and it kind of sucks. And it sucks to be on one side of it. And I just hope that everybody uses it as like just a repositioning, and like to just kind of grow and do something different or added to whatever that is, because it’s crazy. You know, it’s just crazy out there. And I think it’s cool that … it seems to be more places to go now. It’s just, it’s just different. You know, the business has just changed so much, and I don’t know what it’s going to keep looking like, especially with touring in the next five years, if it doesn’t turn around somehow.”
James was asked if there’s been interest in her from AEW:
“I don’t know, I never was like, technically reached out by AEW. But I think they all knew that I was going to work with my husband at NWA. And I really wanted to do this women’s show. That was really important to me. Um, yeah, I think there’s obviously matches and girls I wanted to work with, and I certainly would have entertained it or talked about it. But I think my history with Impact too. And I felt like, even with Empowerrr, I was able to kind of bridge some of those gaps and make relationships happen and open up kind of those conversations and doors. And I didn’t know if I wanted to sign anything long term, like locked in for like, a multi year or anything like that, either. I’ve just kind of because I’ve been doing it for so long. And I just don’t know, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I just knew I wanted to do the girls show. And then I would think about wrestling after that…I only wrestle for Impact and NWA and now WWE…I really have so many things I’m working on now between our supplement company, and mommying, as much as I can full time all the time when I am home, and my horses and stuff, and I just want to be able to focus that time on him and those things, and then there’s little projects, and then just wrestle for the championship, and stuff like that.”
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article please credit Ariel Helwani with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription
