WWE's Becky Lynch On Ronda Rousey: "She Couldn't Wrestle"
Becky Lynch gives her thoughts on Ronda Rousey's time with WWE.
Currently doing a promotional tour for her The Man: Not Your Average Average Girl, WWE's Becky Lynch has given some thoughts on Ronda Rousey's time with WWE.
During an appearance on Ariel Helwani's MMA Hour (via WrestlingNews.co), the headline-grabbing quote from Lynch will be that Rousey "couldn't wrestle". The wider context, though, is that Ronda was thrown into an excellent, WrestleMania-stealing tag match in her debut - teaming with the legendary Kurt Angle to take on another all-time great, Triple H, and Stephanie McMahon - and was then expected to continue that momentum, despite not having a pro wrestling background.
As Becky explained when asked about Ronda Rousey:
"I don't think anybody was trying to make anybody fail. Nobody's trying to make anybody fail. I think when you love this, you look to try and make it better. How can I make this better? She was coming from a different industry. She was a star. She should have been handled differently in terms of, I think she had such a great first outing that everybody thought, 'She can wrestle'. I mean this with respect, but she couldn't wrestle. What we do isn't something that you can have one good match and then, 'Okay, yeah. I'm off to the races'. It's a craft. and you have to learn your craft and you have to be diligent about learning your craft. Everybody treated Ronda like she already knew it because when she first came in she was good in that first bout, but she was also working with Kurt Angle. She was working with Triple H, Stephanie McMahon. It was a well-rehearsed match because everybody wanted her to succeed. It was like, 'Okay, she can do this, off to the races'. That was mishandling her because she was a star in her own right and she did so much for MMA."
This comes on the heels of Ronda Rousey promoting her own book - Our Fight - where certain interviews have seen the Rowdy One lambast WWE creative for changing plans for her to face Becky Lynch one-on-one when Ronda returned to the company in 2022.
Of course, Rousey has been extremely critical of the wider WWE during those same various interviews, slamming the "casting couch culture" at times in place at the company, comparing Vince McMahon to Star Wars' nefarious Emperor Palpatine, and taking several shots at John Laurinaitis and Bruce Prichard. However, one person Ronda has had praise for is Paul Levesque, and stated how she wishes her WWE runs took place under his stewardship.