TNA superstar and current Knockouts Champion Jordynne Grace recently joined Fightful for an in-depth conversation about her appearance in the WWE Royal Rumble matchup this past weekend, and how that surprise came together. Highlights from the interview can be found below.
Whether she thought WWE bringing her in was just a publicity stunt:
I don’t really know what I thought. First of all, Scott doesn’t really ever call me. When I saw the call, my immediate instinct was to not answer it because I thought I might be in trouble about something, who knows what. When I answered it and he told me that, I didn’t really know what to think. I didn’t think it was a publicity stunt that was being pitched. Honestly, when he said it, I was like, ‘Maybe this is just an idea that they have and it’s not for real. Maybe they are testing the waters a little bit.’ Honestly, I did not think it was going to happen until I got my actual flight to Orlando to go to the PC. That’s when everything started to feel real.
Recalls everything she had to get done before competing in the match
I had to get the physical, the medical stuff done. It was a lot of waiting for everything to be approved. A lot of the stuff went through Scott just because I’m with TNA, and I don’t know the legal logistics and everything. It had to go through Scott. I ended up getting my flight information, my hotel. They put me at a different hotel than all the main wrestlers. I guess that’s the ‘surprise hotel.’ On Thursday, I flew out to the PC [WWE Performance Center] in Orlando and from there I drove to Tampa that night. They asked me if I wanted to go home on Friday and I was like, ‘No, I just need a day to mentally prepare myself for this.’ I ended up, that day, going to the gym and trying to be as normal as possible. Spray tan and all that normal stuff. Saturday was the day.
Says WWE talent were surprised when she showed up to rehearsal:
I didn’t tell anybody, besides my husband [Jonathan Gresham]. I didn’t tell any wrestlers because I was so scared of anything getting out, which of course, it did anyway, but it could have gotten out (sooner). Ruining surprises, you can’t have surprises in wrestling anymore. People were shocked. I saw so many people that I’ve known for years. They all thought this was my official debut. No, I’m TNA Knockouts Champion and I’m here representing TNA. That was even more shocking to them. I saw Chelsea Green, who was really mad that I didn’t tell her. She came up and she hit me. ‘Someone just texted me and said you were here and I didn’t believe them, but here you are.’ She was really upset that I didn’t tell her. ‘It’s better that I’m here as a surprise.’ I also didn’t tell Trinity, which was the funniest thing. All week, I’m texting her, ‘I’m really excited to see you in the Rumble.’ What she didn’t know is I was going to be standing across the ring seeing her.