Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
What's up, everybody? You're listening to the Busted Open podcast. It's your girl, Denise Salcedo, and we got to get into some TNA impact. We got a brand new TNA knockouts, world champion crowns in Lei Yingli. Let's talk about it.
This is the Busted Open podcast.
Laying Lee is champion once again.
Chapter 2: What led to Lei Ying Lee becoming the new Knockouts Champion?
Congratulations to Laying Lee. I do not mind this at all for a couple of reasons, by the way. First and foremost, Ariana Grace. I got to tell you, I thought she did a good job as knockouts champion, and I'll tell you why. She had several matches.
on tna like she had quite a few she did a little bit of everything you know she defended the title against jody thread she defended it against both danny luna and laying lee in a triple threat and then on top of that she also um she also had a couple of other little tag team matches in here in between then but she was consistently on the show is what i'm trying to get at
She was consistently on the show. And one of the things that she did very well was really show off her charisma, her talking skills, the way that she is as a character. And I think that for the most part, that's what we kind of expected out of Ariana from the second that she won the championship. We were really expecting to see her storyline just continue to grow.
And it was around this time that, you know, she was doing the stuff right. with her dad. She also made a lot of, you know, she's still an NXT talent. So she made a shit ton of NXT appearances. She's with Birthright. So she kind of had a lot going on both on the TNA side of things and on the NXT side of things. And so I think that having
Ariana as champion for the last you know what two months or so however long that was I really feel like it did a lot for Ariana it really started to give her a little bit more momentum and I think that prior to her winning the knockouts championship. She was somebody that we enjoyed on NXT.
We thought she was funny, but we were rarely ever seeing her like we didn't really get to see Ariana that often. And we didn't really know where she was that in terms of her potential. How do we see her because at this point, we really just saw her as a comedy act.
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Chapter 3: How did Ariana Grace perform during her championship reign?
And now I feel like we are starting to see her more as a wrestler coming off of her knockouts championship run. But more so still that she hasn't lost the personality, though, that she has been showing. So I do want to say that I thought she did a pretty tremendous job and she did a lot with the championship.
But now that we're back to laying Lee laying Lee, when she won the title, I remember it being this moment the first time that she won the title. I remember it being this moment, an emotional one, where people were watching her reaction to winning this championship and everybody kept thinking like, oh my God, like she finally did it.
Mind you, this was a woman that came off of a run in WWE that really didn't go too well. so for laying lee to then go to tna and make herself into something win the championship and then end up getting more wwe tv time as a tna wrestler than she did as an actual wwe wrestler is pretty damn impressive so i feel though that even afterwards though it kind of felt like she lost the title
pretty soon we didn't get as much as we thought in terms of competitiveness and competitive bouts for laying lee and therefore in a way i now see it as a as a i don't hate the title kind of going back and forth i think right now with the knockouts division there are there there could be more depth in the division and i do want to see some more women come into the division
and that's one of the things that i've been talking about now for quite a while i almost feel like i sound like a broken record with that that i definitely do want to see more women come in here just so that we can have more different types of matchups and more challengers and maybe some fresh new champions because i do think if we had more people on the show who knows if ariana would have lost the title back to laggingly
Who knows if Laying Lee would have had as short of a run as she did because they were clearly trying to keep things alive and trying to keep things feeling exciting on the show. And so now I'm looking at this going, okay, Laying Lee is getting another opportunity to kind of finish off what she had started. So I'm liking what they're doing here. I like the back and forth. I don't mind it.
Two very different individuals in both Ariana and Laying Lee. Hey, Andre, what did you think about Laying Lee taking back her championship? And where do you kind of see the direction of the knockouts title going?
So with Lei Ying taking the title back, that is a TNA person taking back the title from an NXT star. So that is her saying I'm the face of this company and try to kick Ariana out or just throw her to the side and say with this title. Now I can really uplift this knockouts division.
And I definitely see Lei Yingli as a fighting champion the same way that Darby Allin has been fighting every week on Dynamite. I hope that Lei Ying, every week you're seeing that knockouts title on the line. Everybody's lining up. And who knows, we might get some new faces along the way because we've been seeing a lot of new faces pop up as of late.
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Chapter 4: What impact did Lei Ying Lee's first title win have on her career?
I'm not sure if it's still going to this day. But how did being part of this show sort of skyrocket you? Because I imagine it did.
Um, so I also I think there is like one like now with like the newer influencer girls, but, um, the show definitely boosted me because I think a lot of other places kind of took me more serious as like an actor or an actress like I My like biggest dreams still is I would love to still be an actress, but that helps me land other like things like I did Matlock on CBS, which was awesome.
I got to act with Kathy Bates, you know, that helped me get other opportunities for sure.
OK, now you say you're doing chicken girls. It's a totally different world. How on earth did you go from chicken girls from Brad TV series to pro wrestler? What happened there?
So, I mean, I lived in L.A. for a while. I did influencing, all of that. I was at my senior year of high school, and I was like, man, like, I don't want to be homeschooled for my senior year. I want to, like, you know, do the cap and gown throw and, like, actually, like, you know, just... Growing up like that is, like, so different for a childhood.
I kind of just wanted to have that, like, experience. Like, I didn't want to grow up and not have that. So I originally am from Georgia. I moved back to Georgia. I started going to school here without knowing anybody anymore. Um... And kind of in school, I did theater and, you know, I just was kind of out of social media, but I would still, you know, be on it.
And I remember I was on my phone one night and I saw a TikTok of Rhea Ripley pop up, of course. And I was like, she's so cool. Like, what is she doing? Because it was like, it was Liv Morgan and her and they were like, you know, it was like a compilation of like their feud. And I was like, like, what is this? This is like, this isn't a show. It's not a show. They're like...
beating each other up like this is interesting like I need to see like what this is and I had seen WWE before because like kids like boys in my class like we're always fans of John Cena and like things like that and I was like okay let me like check this out and so I started watching and then the first raw I ever watched was the one that came to Netflix because I can actually like watch it
And I immediately was like, oh, like, dang, like, I think this is something I could do. Like, I really liked it because it combined like a lot of the stuff that I had already done. Like, I feel like I could put dance into it because I saw some girls doing like flips and stuff like that. And I saw that it was also like acting and I get to
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Chapter 5: Why is there a need for more depth in the Knockouts division?
So there's so much I'm still figuring out.
So you've been training. I'm trying to think now. So I'm going to say maybe a little over a year now, a year and a half, I would assume. A year and I think three months. Okay, so you're very early on in your wrestling career. Where are you at right now of your wrestling career? How many matches have you had? What's your week look like for training, matches, moments, promotions you've worked with?
So now I would say, well, I debuted, I debuted really fast. I debuted about like four months in, like my coach was like, my coach wanted me to debut like two months in. And I was like, ah, I don't feel ready. Like he was like, you're ready. You're just ready. And, um,
I feel like with training, like I would go from, I don't train, get to train as much anymore because now I'm traveling and going to shows. But when I started, it was like, I would have school, go to theater, right after theater, drive an hour to training, go to sleep and then go to school and do it every day.
But now I would say when I'm not traveling, I definitely do try to train throughout the week as long as, and do the show that we have at our school. Shows now, I have one every weekend, usually Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Sometimes I have shows on Mondays and Thursdays. I've wrestled a Monday, Thursday, Wednesday, and then I wrestled the weekend too.
Sometimes that's crazy, but I'm definitely still in the beginning. I'm still very much trying to get my name out there, and I'm still very new.
No, I love that because you are you're committing to it and shows. And I think that, you know, you come from a very different world current like I know this world. I know the influencer world. I know the tick tock red carpet, all of that type of world. And I know the wrestling world and it's a night and day difference.
And when you're navigating two polar opposite worlds, oh, my God, what has the learning experience? And I guess you can say the transition of being used to that to then going to where you're at now?
Well, I would definitely say, yeah, they're very different. But thankfully, I have a very, very good support system around me when it comes to wrestling. I've had a lot of people and people that are higher up than me that have been doing this for a while that have helped guide me in a really good direction and helped teach me on what to do and what not to do.
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Chapter 6: What are the highlights from Mike Santana's championship journey?
The second you go out there, it just clicks. You mentioned earlier that Rhea Ripley was the first person that you saw that was really just, oh, I want to be like her. Have you ever had a chance to meet her, talk to her, pick her brain or has it not happened yet?
Yeah, so I have... This was my second year, this one that just happened, but my first year going to WrestleMania, I went with WWE. They invited me there because I'm also an influencer, so...
got to go with them and they arranged for me to meet her backstage after her match and i got to talk with her and make like a tiktok with her and she is one of the only people that i've ever like been silent like i did not know what to say i was like she like had me like starstruck because just It's, like, so rare that you see people with such star power.
Like, she's just a full package, and I just think she's so cool. And I just didn't know what to say. But she was really, really nice, and she made my freaking life.
Yeah.
Oh, that's so sweet. I love that because now, you know, Rhea Ripley, you know, obviously she's still so young and, you know, it's got so many years left ahead of her, but already in the time that she has been with WWE, she's already started to inspire fans. So many people and she's inspiring this whole new generation of young female wrestlers and it's brilliant. It's so brilliant.
Like in a few years, you and so many other wrestlers that we see come about are going to say, I was inspired by Rhea Ripley and she's doing that.
I have seen her specifically and her being so popular on TikTok and other platforms. Honestly, without her even knowing, she has inspired a lot of younger girls from my generation. And those girls on TikTok that are my age, like 13 to 18, a lot of them have been like, oh, I'm young, now I can start. Because she started at a really young age, too. So people see that.
And I think, yeah, she's a very big part of this younger generation of people. Wrestling.
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