At the Royal Rumble this year, Ronda Rousey made a spectacular comeback to WWE in a way she never did. However, given her past experiences with the crowd, Rousey wasn’t pleased and anticipated the worse.
Ronda Rousey started her career with WWE in 2018 with a debut at WrestleMania 34. In her short time career, she has already achieved the RAW Woman’s Championship and has become the only woman to be the champion in both the UFC and WWE, which surfaced her as the only woman to dominate the headlines of a pay-per-view event in both companies.
Despite all this, Rousey’s experience with the WWE fans was quite unpleasant before the return to the royal rumble. In a Wild Ride Podcast, Rousey said, “What am I doing it for if I’m not being able to spend my time and energy on my family, but instead spending my time and my energy on a bunch of fucking ungrateful fans that don’t even appreciate me?”
She also said, “The thing is, I love performing. I love the girls. I love being out there. “But, at the end of the day, I was just like, ‘Fuck these fans, dude.’ My family loves me. They appreciate me. I want all of my energy to go into them.”
Even though she had a stressful experience, her return couldn’t have been any better. She surprised everyone by entering at No. 28 earlier in the Royal Rumble. Shayna Baszler, Bianca Belair, Rousey, and Flair made up the final four in the ring. But in the end, it came down to Rousey and Flair.
The two knocked each other down, and when Flair jumped Rousey in the corner, Rousey grabbed her leg and threw her over, which is how Ronda Rousey won the 2022 Royal Rumble. Later in an interview with MMA Legend, she revealed that she was expecting boos from the fans as her past experiences with the fans weren’t pleasing. She stated, “I was expecting boos.
I came out with my guard up. I didn’t get to enjoy that moment because I was expecting what I got on the way out, so when I came out and everyone popped. I just blocked them out, didn’t let them in, and just went in, did my job, and got out. I think I kind of really missed out on enjoying that moment, because I was expecting the worst.”
The reaction of the fans made a choice for WWE to make her appear on RAW as a face what she didn’t agree upon. She wanted to go in as a heel, but the management told her, “you need to smile and you need to stop being a b***h”.
Above all, This year wasn’t so successful for the baddest woman on the planet that she recently lost the WWE Women’s Championship to Liv Morgan at July’s Money in the Bank pay-per-view and also was unsuccessful in regaining the belt in the rematch at Summer Slam later the month.
When questioned about the future of a recent gaming stream, Ronda highlighted that she is satisfied with a non-title narrative and is not interested in any title storylines right now.
