wrestling / News

Raquel Rodriguez On Her Friendship With Shotzi, Working With Her In WWE

March 19, 2023 | Posted by Jeremy Thomas
Shotzi Raquel Rodriguez WWE Smackdown Image Credit: WWE

Raquel Rodriguez has been friends with Shotzi for a long time, and she recently talked about working with her in WWE. Rodriguez spoke with Fightful for a new interview and talked about her friendship with her fellow Smackdown star; you can check out some highlights below:

On attending the same tryout as Shotzi: “You know what’s so funny? Shotzi was actually in my tryouts. So we both had our tryouts with NXT, I believe it was in 2016. She looked completely different. She was the only girl there that actually had wrestling experience at the time because I had just started out, my father was only letting me roll around and train with a select few. So my knowledge of wrestling was very, very minimal. So I’ve known her since then.

“Then getting the opportunity to know that I would go with EVOLVE and have my first gimmick—a street fight is what it was. So we were using chairs, we were using my bull rope, we were using ladders. That was the first time I ever had a match like that and it was against Shotzi. She was already known for being this hardcore super ready to do whatever and take whatever type of person. I was like, ‘Alright, this is where you really get tested if you want to do this. ‘Cause you gotta shut up or you gotta put up, and we’re gonna do it, dang it.”

On working with Shotzi in NXT and on the main roster: “It was really, really fun because I felt like we built a good friendship, a good bond, a good amount of trust where we could now bring that into NXT. My first ladder match was with Shotzi in NXT. I feel like our friendship has really grown over time and getting to tag with her on Smackdown and work against her on Smackdown. It’s been really, really fun to have those moments with her.”