Former WWE star Shotzi has discussed being replaced in the women's Royal Rumble match, despite being originally scheduled to take part in it.
The former WWE NXT Women's Tag Team Champion spoke on the "Daria & Toni Unwrapped" podcast, featuring former WWE starSonya Deville, where she stated that WWE informed her about her being added to the Rumble match a day before it happened. However, she eventually lost that spot to the returning Alexa Bliss.
"Well, so I heard mixed messages. A couple of producers said that I was always in the Rumble, but then they told me last minute, and then like ... I was veryconfused by it, but they didn't relay anything to me until like the day before. It was like 3:00 p.m. the day before Rumble, and they were like, 'Hey, can you get on a flight in the couple hours?' And then I'm like, 'Oh my god, I'm not ready for this,' and just packed my bags I don't even know what I put in my bags, and got to the airport in like an hour and then and then it led to nothing. The day I got told while I was in the makeup chair that I wasn't in it."
The former WWE star, however, clarified that she had no issues with Bliss replacing her in the match and added that, at the very least, her replacement received a big pop from the audience. She also stated that Bliss was unaware she was replacing another star who had originally been scheduled for the match.
Shotzi recalled that the plans WWE laid out for her prior to the Royal Rumble involved her teaming withMia Yim, aka Michin, and that the duo was going to feud with Chelsea Green and her group.
Unfortunately, that never came to fruition as WWE constantly changed plans for Shotzi and co.
"I was in the process of going back to SmackDown, and like I'm told, 'Oh yeah, we'll have you like feud with Chelsea. You and Mia can get together and take on her crew.' And it just never happened. Like, it was just, week after week like [WWE saying], 'Hey, we're going to do we're going to get to this match.' And then they'd be like, 'Oh, we're going to move it to next week. We're going to move it to next week. We'll probably wait until after we're back from the Europe tour. Oh, we're probably going to have to wait until after 'Mania.' It just was like that over and over. And then like as soon as 'Mania was coming around and I still didn't hear anything, that's when I was like, 'Okay, like my contract's up soon, like now I'm getting worried.'"
Shotzi had returned to "NXT" last year after featuring on the main roster for a few years, but she revealed that her stint on the developmental brand was to be a short one and that WWE had planned for her to return to the main roster after her injury. But that never happened as she was released in May alongside several other wrestlers.
