Two-time WWE Women’s Champion Molly Holly made a surprise WWE appearance to when she participated in the first-ever Women’s Royal Rumble match. In an interview with Wrestling INC prior to the PPV event, Holly discussed her WWE start, shares her favorite while in the company and reveals which current Superstar she is most impressed with. Highlights of the interview below.
On approaching the WWE after her WCW release: “They didn’t contact me, I contacted them,” Holly said. “[Someone] told me that they weren’t going to exercise the second year of my contract, so I called Dean Malenko, who is a mentor and a friend of mine, and I asked him, ‘I’m not staying on with the WCW, how do I get in with the WWF?’ And he said, ‘Come to a show, come backstage, and I will introduce you to Jim Ross.’ The show was actually in Atlanta, and the WCW actually already bought me a plane ticket to Atlanta, so I just took the ticket that Ted Turner bought me to go backstage to the WWF and I met with Jim Ross, and Jim Ross already had the heads up.”
On Jim Ross giving her first role in the WWE: “So we had a meeting, where he informed me, ‘We start out our girls as one of The Godfather’s ladies.’ I was like, ‘Oh, great. Yeah.’ And he was listing all the girls who went on to be famous as a result, and then he said that he’d like to offer me a developmental contract. And I said, ‘Yeah, that’s great.’ So I flew home and started making money right away – I was getting severance from WCW, and I was getting developmental guarantees from the WWF. The highlight of my career was sitting home and getting paid by two companies. But eventually, they sent me to Memphis to train with the likes of Bryan Danielson (Daniel Bryan), the Mean Street Posse, Victoria (Miss Kitty) – there was a whole group of us that trained there.”
On her favorite moment while in WWE: “I don’t know. A lot of my favorite moments didn’t have anything to do with being on TV. 49 states, 15 different countries – I mean, there’s so many awesome things that I thought, ‘Wow, people save their whole life to go on vacation to Melbourne Australia, and I’m getting paid to be here.’ Or, Helsinki Finland. Or wherever these gigs took me. I would be the one who would skip the gym to go see the sites. As far as my television career, I really enjoyed my character’s storyline with Spike Dudley. It was fun to have acting skits and the things that the fans could get involved with, get behind, root for. So, my Disney romance with Spike Dudley was by far one of my favorite things in my time with the WWF.”
On which current Superstar she’s impressed with: “Charlotte really impressed me when she started doing some gymnastics things,” she said. “These are things normally done by girls when they’re five-foot-one and eighty pounds. But the fact that she can do them and she’s so big is remarkable. I remember the first time I saw Brock Lesnar do this top-roll thing, and I was like, ‘What? Wow! But he’s huge!’ So that’s how I feel with Charlotte – she’s doing things that gravity is screaming, ‘Don’t do that!’ And she’s like, ‘F you gravity!’ So, she really blows my mind.”
Holly currently serves as a female coach at “The Academy School of Professional Wrestling” in Minneapolis, Minnesota owned by Ken Anderson and Shawn Daivari.
What did you think of the interview? Were happy to see Molly Holly participate in the Royal Rumble match? What are your favorite Molly Holly moments? Let us know in the comments below!