Mandy Rose was not happy with the direction of her character before moving to NXT
Mandy Rose recently admitted that she was unhappy with her WWE gimmick before moving down to NXT.
Mandy Rose first started her career as part of WWE Tough Enough in 2015, when she made the finals. Despite not winning the show, Rose was signed to a WWE deal, and debuted on the main roster. She immediately struggled to get over with the fans despite being a regular on WWE television.
After floundering on the main roster for several years, Rose was finally moved down to NXT, where she flourished and became one of the greatest NXT Women's Champions of all time.
The former WWE star recently appeared on the Power Alphas Podcast with her fiancé Tino Sabbatelli, where she revealed that she was unhappy with her character before she moved down to NXT.
"[I] wasn’t very happy with what I was doing at that moment. So, in my head, I looked at it as a positive reinforcement of like this could be something really big and really new and innovative for me. I didn’t look at it of anything else." [23:09 - 23:24]
Mandy Rose's father was hesitant about WWE job
Before Mandy Rose was a regular feature on WWE RAW and SmackDown, she was part of WWE Tough Enough. However, she had to move to Orlando, Florida for three months to do the show. When she informed her parents about this, her father was hesitant at first.
During the same podcast episode, Rose revealed that her father was initially very hesitant about her doing WWE Tough Enough.
"So, I call my dad, mom, everyone I’m like 'guys, I’m going to go try out to be on this reality show' and right away my dad’s like 'what do you mean? What reality show?' And I was like 'It’s with WWE. It’s kind of like a road rules challenge type thing' not that he even knew what it was but you know, 'it could catapult me into something really big I could become a WWE Superstar' and my dad was like 'alright, well, I don’t know' like he was very very hesitant. He was hesitant for a long time." [11:16 - 11:56]
Rose has indeed come a long way from her time in WWE Tough Enough and is now a bonafide star, thanks to her time in NXT.
What do you make of Mandy Rose's time in NXT? Sound off in the comments section below.