Thunder Rosa Reveals Name of the AEW Star That Helped Her When She Got Cleared
AEW's Thunder Rosa reveals Kris Statlander helped her when she got cleared to wrestle.
After a year away from AEW with an injury, former AEW Women's World Champion Thunder Rosa recently made her long-awaited return. Rosa was on commentary during Abadon's match on AEW Collision when TBS Champion Julia Hart made her presence known. They began fighting in the ring but when Skye Blue inserted herself into the brawl, Rosa evened up the odds and saved Abadon from further injury. A week later, Hart and Blue teamed up against Rosa and Abadon on the Holiday Bash edition of AEW Collision, picking up the win.
Rosa recently got candid on Busted Open Radio about her return, how she didn't want to get desperate about when she would return to AEW programming following her clearance, because the decision wasn't up to her. "I just keep reminding myself that I'm not going to be desperate. I'm not going to be mad. I just did it. You know, it is what it is. You just have to wait your turn. The most important part for me was the comeback, and I'm back, so people can stop asking when are you going to be back in the ring. Then don't ask me if you don't see me in the ring. You know, that's not up to me. I'm ready and I'm willing and I'm healthy and that's what matters and I'm here to work," Rosa said.
She continued to highlight some of the women who have really stepped up over the last year to improve the division, including "Timeless" Toni Storm, Hart, and ROH Women's World Champion Athena. "I am here to make the division better, you know, assist my peers who have been holding this division for the entire year to the best of their ability and some of them have become champions and some of them became champions two or three times and they have developed their characters to a point where you never thought they would," Rosa continued. "Perfect example, that crazy, most delusional of them all, which is Timeless Toni Storm. She's very popular and people are really into her character and what she's doing inside and outside of the ring. The same thing goes for Julia Hart, who a lot of people were just seeing her as somebody young and naive and look at her. She has become one of the fan favorites. The entrance and with her wrestling, her short vignettes, and everything, so they had done a pretty tremendous job on that. Willow Nightingale. Kris Statlander. Let's not forget Athena. Athena has had some of the best matches of her career at ROH. There are so many more honestly and I am very proud of working with the women that I'm working with at the moment. They're very uplifting."
Additionally, Rosa revealed that when she got cleared to wrestle again, the first first to step up and help was former TBS Champion Kris Statlander. Statlander is no stranger to near career-ending injuries as she's injured both of her knees in the past. Nine months after she injured her right knee, she returned at the AEW Double or Nothing pay-per-view in 2023 where she defeated Jade Cargill in less than a minute to win her first title in AEW. "I can share this now. I can talk about it. Kris Statlander was the one who helped me with my first match when I got cleared. I have the footage and I was never able to put it out. Probably now I'm gonna at one point, put it on my YouTube. She volunteered to help me because she's been through what I went through in terms of injuries. That to me was very empowering having women that want to help you to get better." (h/t/: WrestlingNews.co)
Rosa has been candid about the injury and her recovery, especially in regards to her mental health. "I had to learn so many other things to not go f--king insane. Because wrestling was taken away from me because of an injury that almost ended my career," Rosa stated on Busted Open Radio in November. "The fact that I was able to run three miles without pain this last Thursday or Wednesday, the fact that I'm able to lift weights, to sleep, to sit down, to sit up, to be on an airplane without pain, it's beautiful. The fact of the matter that I get another opportunity to get my time and to get what belongs to me, it's a blessing. I'm not gonna let anyone, and I'm putting everybody on notice, tell me otherwise. I've been through f--king hell, and I don't care if I have to go through f--king hell to get what I need to get because I am going to get it. I'm f--king Thunder Rosa. La Mera Mera. They call me La Mera Mera for a f--king reason, and that is not because I'm a wimp and I like to complain. No, it's because I work my ass off to get where I want, to get what I deserve, to get what I was born for, and that's to be excellent."
