Layla Reflects on Her LayCool Pairing With Michelle McCool, Credits CM Punk for Coming Up With the Nickname

During a recent interview with Insight with Chris Van Vliet, former WWE Superstar and Women’s Champion Layla (aka Layla El) discussed her career, her LayCool pairing with Michelle McCool, CM Punk coming up with the duo’s nickname, and more. Below are some highlights from Insight:

Layla on CM Punk Coming Up With the LayCool Name

“Yeah, he did. He wasn’t even part of the conversation. That’s what’s so funny about it. Because Johnny or somebody, I can’t remember, was like, ‘Guys, you need a name? You’ve been together too long now, it’s getting ridiculous. You need a name.’ Punk was hanging out at the arena, and he just was like, ‘What are you guys doing?’ We had a piece of paper, and we were trying to write something. We’re like, we’re trying to think of a name. And then we were Cool-Lay, it was so stupid. And then he’s like, ‘LayCool?’ Then we’re like, yeah, that’s it. Punk just happened to be there. We were just in the corridor, I don’t know, just happened.”

On How They Got Paired Together

“Mickie was brought to SmackDown. Michelle and Mickie were going to go against each other; they first had Alicia Fox. If you noticed, she was out there doing matches with Michelle. They needed a filler, and they were like, Layla. So they would put me in there to be the filler so that they wouldn’t touch each other, and they’d save it for the pay-per-view. It just started like that. I was never supposed to be in LayCool, because I know that Stephanie McMahon wanted to do like a mean girl faction kind of thing, and I think it was definitely Michelle, and it was gonna be, I think, Alicia Fox, and then for some reason, me and Michelle working together, and just the chemistry, and just trust. She trusted me. She gave me so many opportunities, I don’t know, it just happened.”

On How Their Co-Champions Run Was Pitched To Them

“It wasn’t. So the idea that I remember was it was going to be Vickie Guerrero. She used to come out with me and Michelle before. It was pitched that Vickie was going to win the title, just Vickie. So they needed the title to go on somebody else, but my gut was it was Fit Finlay that fought for me. I think it was him, because the day of, about maybe two hours before the show, like, Fit comes up and he’s like, ‘Congratulations, champ.’ I’m like, ‘Congratulations, champ?’ He goes, ‘You’re going to win a title.’ He was known for always ribbing everybody and just telling everybody, playing jokes. I’m thinking, what the hell is he talking about? I didn’t even listen. We went through the whole match, stuff like that. I’m waiting this entire time for them to be like, ‘Ha ha!’ Because he would do that, like he would make jokes on us and stuff like that, and it never happened. It just never happened. Went through the match, and I won the women’s championship. What? Co-women’s Champion? It was the biggest surprise to me. But if you even look at the crowd, it was in Beth Phoenix’s hometown, and there was no reaction. It was crickets. No one expected me to win that. It was perfect.”

On How They Came Up With the Idea to Cut the Belts in Half

“They didn’t know, because remember, they made up their mind that day. They made up their mind a few hours before the show. But Michelle was like, well, why don’t we do co-champions kind of thing? Because then it’s like we can have our friendship, blah blah, blah. Michelle fought for that and I fought for that, and that’s what happened, and nobody knew what was going to happen, and then it was actually Batista. One day we were rehearsing, and he came up and he was like, ‘Hey, I just told Vince, you guys just split the titles like you have with your necklaces.’ That’s how it happened.”

Layla previously opted to quit WWE and step away from wrestling back in 2015. Her LayCool partner, Michelle McCool, was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2025.