5 real-life romances that have reportedly generated backstage heat in WWE
Several WWE Superstars have dated over the past few decades. While some of these couples were popular in the WWE locker room, others were not. Some real-life relationships between WWE Superstars have reportedly generated backstage heat.
A former Women's champion eventually retired from in-ring competition due to the heat she got for dating a top superstar. Meanwhile, another former Divas Champion confessed that dating a top wrestler made her life harder.
Here are five real-life romances that have reportedly generated backstage heat in WWE.
#5. WWE Hall of Famer The Undertaker and Michelle McCool
Two years after joining Vince McMahon's company in 2004, Michelle McCool and her first husband, Jeremy Alexander, divorced. In 2007, The Undertaker and his second wife, Sara Frank, also split. Later that same year, The Deadman and the former Women's Champion started dating.
In an interview with Chasing Glory, McCool disclosed that she and The Undertaker initially tried to hide their relationship:
"We started dating, and I knew what was gonna come with that. And so it was hard. I hid it for a long time, we hid it for a long time in the work place, for several months. He had a bus at this point, which a lot of the guys do now, I would literally wait until everybody left the building so nobody saw me get on the bus. I would do anything I possibly could to make people still see Michelle for Michelle, not for Undertaker’s, at the time, girlfriend," she said. [H/T: 411 Mania]
However, things quickly changed for McCool backstage when her romance with The Deadman came to light.
The former Women's Champion got a lot of heat backstage as several co-workers believed she was getting opportunities only because of her relationship with The Undertaker. Due to this, the 42-year-old decided to leave WWE and hang up her boots in 2011.
"It was tough just leaving in itself was tough because it got to a point where I was dealing with so much again mostly being Undertaker's girlfriend and why I was on TV and even having a writer throw the papers up one day and say 'Why don't we just call it the Michelle McCool and Undertaker show?!' It was nonstop and I went to Vince on numerous occasions and bless his heart he was wonderful, but I just said Vince, I don't wanna hate something that I grew up loving so much and the longer I stay the more I'm like like getting a sour taste in my mouth," she added.
A year before her retirement, McCool married The Undertaker. They now have a daughter together.
#4. WWE EVP Triple H and CBO Stephanie McMahon
While working together on a storyline in 1999, Triple H and Stephanie McMahon developed feelings for each other. The couple started dating in 2000. However, not everyone in the WWE locker room was thrilled about their romantic relationship.
In his book "Making the Game: Triple H's Approach to a Better Body," the 52-year-old revealed that he got a lot of heat backstage when he started dating The Chairman's daughter:
"People really started to get negative about my role in the company and how it was bulls**t that I was still working but also helping make decisions. It bothered me somewhat at first because I felt that so many of the same people who two years earlier were praising me - 'You're the hardest-working guy in the business,' they'd say or 'The sh*t you're doing right now is the greatest thing in the entire industry' - were now saying I had no talent, no ability, and the only reason I was in the top spot at all was because I was 'ban**** the boss's daughter'," Triple H wrote.
The Game also disclosed that some people tried to destroy his relationship with The Billion Dollar Princess. However, they failed.
"They see that not only are Stephanie and I married, but the love we share is so strong, so real, they don't have a chance to destroy it," Triple H added.
Stephanie McMahon and Triple H have been married since 2003. They now have three daughters.
#3. John Cena and WWE Hall of Famer Nikki Bella
In 2012, John Cena started dating Nikki Bella. Two years later, a report suggested the WWE locker room had some resentment towards the former Divas Champion as her co-workers felt she had let fame get to her head.
The same report also claimed that the former Divas Champion constantly bragged about the expensive things Cena bought her, which her colleagues viewed as crass and tacky.
After Carmella accused Bella of using her connection to Cena to advance her career on SmackDown, Nikki spoke about getting real-life backstage heat for dating the 16-time World Champion in an interview with Digital Spy in 2016.
She stated that she had heard the same accusations since she started her relationship with Cena. The 38-year-old also disclosed that WWE management sometimes treated her differently to avoid other superstars thinking these accusations were true:
"It's not the first time I've heard it. I've actually had to hear it for the past four years of my life. Every. Single. Day. (...) I am with a very successful man and the crazy thing is people think that it makes my career easier. No, it makes my career so much harder, because no matter how hard I work I'm always going to have people take away everything I do because of John. I won’t get certain things because people will be like, 'Oh, people are gonna think she has this because of John' so let's just not give it to me," she said.
John Cena and Nikki Bella got engaged in 2017 after The Leader of the Cenation proposed to the former Divas Champion at WrestleMania 33. However, they split nearly a year later, only a month before their wedding.
#2. WWE Hall of Famers Shawn Michaels and Sunny
In late 1996, Sunny and Shawn Michaels kicked off their romantic relationship. Sunny was then on a break from her relationship with her high school sweetheart Chris Candido. However, the WWE locker room did not know about it and felt sorry for Candido, as they thought he and Sunny were still together.
Speaking on his podcast, WWE SVP Bruce Prichard revealed that most of the WWE locker room was unsupportive of Michaels and Sunny's relationship:
"The general sentiment of the locker room and everybody else was more of not, 'oh my God, they're over there f***ing' was 'poor Chris [Candido]' because it just put Chris in a bad light. It put him in a horrible, awkward position," he said. [H/T: 411 Mania]
However, things later changed when the locker room realized that Candido probably knew about Sunny's affair with Michaels and did nothing about it:
"The fact that he did nothing, people got to the point where they stopped feeling sorry for him and were kind of like, 'okay, dumba**, if you're not going to do anything, you're going to let this little girl run all over you and do this s**t in your face, then you don't deserve anybody to feel bad for you because you're letting it happen and you're not doing anything about it.' [Doing] nothing basically made the situation worse for [Candido] and the way the guys looked at him. And then, it became the viewpoint of Sunny and Shawn, kind of like, 'well, the boyfriend doesn't care. Why should we care?'" Prichard added.
Sunny and Michaels dated for only a few months. Their romance, however, ended when the 49-year-old refused to move in with The Showstopper. Sunny continued her relationship with Candido until he passed away in 2005.
#1. Lana and Miro
While working and traveling together, Lana and Miro (FKA Rusev) fell for each other. The couple dated for a while before getting engaged in 2015. When news of their engagement leaked, Lana and Miro got a lot of heat backstage.
According to reports, Vince McMahon was unhappy because the couple were working on a storyline in which they were feuding. Miro was even dating Summer Rae on-screen at the time. Hence, the news of his engagement to Lana ruined the angle.
Another report claimed that WWE punished Miro by making him lose a match clean in only three minutes before Summer Rae buried him on live television.
"It was six minutes of Rusev being punished on live national television for getting engaged to his longtime girlfriend. (...) If that wasn't enough, Summer Rae came into the ring and cut Vince McMahon's promo for him. She showed the TMZ headline where it was announced that Rusev and Lana had been engaged for over a month, then totally castrated him as a selfish user who manipulated her for months. All Rusev could do was stand there and take it, and then Summer slapped him and walked off. In this age where Kayfabe has been dead and buried, that was surreal television," the report added.
In an interview with the Talk is Jericho podcast, Lana opened up about getting backstage heat following her engagement to Miro, revealing that WWE also punished her:
"So the story got cut and we got blamed for it. Personally, I got blamed. (...) I got in trouble, I wasn't on television for three months. And I was on television straight for two years. And I was not on television for three months, I was made to feel that it was all my fault. I had to take the blame. And for years I thought maybe it was my fault," she said. [H/T: Essentially Sports]
Miro and Lana tied the knot in July 2016. Four years later, the company released the former United States Champion from his contract due to budget cuts. Nearly a year later, WWE also let his wife go.