During their time in "WWE NXT," Cora Jade (now known as Elayna Black) and Mandy Rose crossed paths on a handful of occasions, including the 2021 Women's WarGames and a fatal-four way for Rose's NXT Women's Championship. Their initial encounter, however, didn't take place inside a ring.
On the "Power Alphas Podcast," Rose recalled her first meeting with Jade in the bathroom following a WWE PC Live session, which Jade described as an opportunity for developmental talents to perform in front of the WWE Performance Center coaches for a graded evaluation. In Jade's case, coaches noted that she moved too fast in her practice match. Combined with the added nerves of it being only her first or second PC Live experience, Jade later had a breakdown, which Rose witnessed.
"Basically what happened was I just had a little match ... I come around to the bathroom and I want to get undressed and get the hell out of there to be honest. But I see this little girl in the corner crying," Rose said in reference to Jade. "You had to probably be 20 [years old]. So I see this little girl crying in the corner and immediately I'm like 'Oh my god' because I see myself and Daria, Sonya Deville, from years ago. Right away I'm like 'Oh my gosh, I've been here. I know the feeling. I need to console her.'"
At the time, Rose had returned to the "NXT" brand following a stint on WWE's main roster with the aim of rebranding herself. "Now I'm at a point where I'm like I don't give a s*** what these coaches say. I'm going to be me," Rose said. "Yeah, I'm working on myself and there's always room for improvement, but you were upset because of all the feedback you were getting."
From Jade's perspective, she especially felt overwhelmed by the many voices weighing in on her in-ring performance, with part of their feedback centering on her pacing. She also wanted to make a good impression on them, but instead believed her outing may have been cause for WWE to let her go.
"The match just didn't go how I wanted it to, which happens sometimes," Jade said, "but being that new and having all that pressure on me, getting all the feedback, constructive criticism ... obviously that's good. I always wanted to have improvements. Especially first coming in, I was trying to get advice from as much people as I could, whether it was Shawn [Michaels], Hunter, other wrestlers, people like [Rose] who had been there longer than me.
"I was just getting so much information from everybody and that's just how it is. You adjust to it, but being there and being so new having all of that thrown on my plate, it immediately felt like 'Oh my god, I'm such a bad wrestler. I shouldn't be here. I'm going to get fired tomorrow.'"
Seeing Jade's emotional aftermath of her critique, Rose remembered comforting her with a reminder that the job of a WWE PC coach is just that to coach the rising talents under the wings. Rose added that no one, including the wrestling greats, was perfect either.
In retrospect, Jade now realizes that the coaches' feedback about her in-ring pacing was a small criticism amongst a wider scale. Also now at 24, Jade is a free agent, with four years of experience at WWE carrying her forward in her next moves.
If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit "Power Alphas Podcast" with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.
