Ronda Rousey Says She Inspired Female WWE Main Events

Over the years, Ronda Rousey has had a lot of things to say about WWE and her time there, not a lot of it good. She has even admitted her appearance in AEW was meant as a cheap shot against WWE parent company TKO. But in a recent interview with Sports Illustrated, she mentioned that she did enjoy the wrestling part of the show when she was there.

“I had a great time; I love playing a real heel,” she said. “Not trying to be the cool-guy heel, or trying to be like, ‘oh, this is just my character.’ Because I feel like that’s what kayfabe is now: people don’t know the difference between the show and the reality, and I wanted to play that up as much as possible. I am me regardless of whether I’m in the ring or not. The time I was in the ring with the girls, I was having the time of my life…being in the ring and actually doing it with those women, was an incredible experience.”

Rousey reiterated what she has always said about Vince McMahon — that his last-minute booking on the fly and lack of collaboration was a real problem for her and anyone else not in the main storyline. But she does feel she deserves credit for female main events in WWE, not because of what she did while there, but because she proved that female fights could draw money in MMA.

“”I’m very aware that women are headlining WWE because of me,” Rousey said. “That women are headlining and making big paydays in boxing because of me. In bare-knuckle boxing, in full-contact karate, in everything that’s a contact sport. I’m very, very proud of seeing all the success the women are having, because I was able to prove their commercial viability, and everyone’s trying to recapture that lightning in a bottle.”

Rousey will face Gina Carano in an MMA match on Netflix tomorrow, May 16th.