Angelina Love is now one of the most experienced members of the Ring of Honor roster, but at one point in time, she was perhaps the face of the Knockouts Division in TNA Wrestling.
TNA, now known as IMPACT Wrestling, is remembered for many things, but most fans would agree that the company was revolutionary with the way it featured women’s wrestlers, years before the Women’s Evolution.
In an interview with Liam Alexander-Stewart of Inside The Ropes, Love, a six-time TNA Knockout’s Women’s Champion, looked back on her role as “an OG” of this division. She called this era one of the highlights of her impressive career and expressed her gratitude to Jeff Jarrett and everyone who made it possible because they collectively changed the game for women’s wrestling.
“When the knockouts division was really kicking it,” said Love when she was asked about a fond memory of this period. “Well, my proudest moment is just it in general, you know, because we, once again, everything is like the right place, right time, right people when it comes to wrestling….So I had got released from WWE in May 2007. Come September, I’ve been hired by TNA so it was just like a five-month period or so in between. And it was like, yeah, it was 2007. And we really got crazy with it in 2008. And it was just the perfect time like WWE was doing PG stuff. And I think everybody wanted to still have that edgy, sexy, you know, kind of saying that wrestling had been, you know, in years previous and that’s what it was, you know, doing the best at that time as well.
“So, I’m just proud that I was an OG of that, you know, like nobody can take away from us ever that we started the knockouts division and it blew up and we’re so thankful to like Jeff Jarrett and everybody who they, it was literally like, well, let’s try it. It’s either gonna sink or swim, right. So that’s kind of like can’t let them down, can’t let ourselves down. Like we all like really, really wanted it to succeed. And we were just so thankful to be given that opportunity. And I think it’s swimming and swam very well.”
Love also credited Vince Russo, a controversial figure in wrestling history, for his role in the success of The Beautiful People. She stated that Russo gave her and Velve Sky a lot of freedom before she noted that this trust in the talent’s input is an important aspect of maximizing their creativity.
“Yeah, so um, I don’t know what anybody’s problem with Vince Russo is, you know, like, you’ll never hear a bad word about him come out of my mouth,” said Love. Like, he’s the reason that we were able to go as far as we were with The Beautiful People, because he always gave us the ball and let us run with it. We could talk to him about anything. He was so personable, he was so easy to work with always open to ideas, you know, if we had like promos, because you know, we were kind of known for like our backstage segments, too.
And like our talking on our promos, and stuff, you know, and if stuff was written down, and we thought were like, I just don’t see myself like being able to say this and make you believe because we were so obsessed with being believable. He would just be like, Oh, yeah, like, make it your own. Just make sure you hit this bullet point, this bullet point, this bullet point, like, I trust you, you know. And like giving us you know, like the talent, that kind of creative freedom, that’s when you get the best out of your talent, you know?”
Looking back on her time in TNA, Love called this period, approximately between 2007 and 2009 her favorite stretch of it because this era was “awesome.”
“When it was like Dutch Mantell, and Jeff Jarrett and Vince Russo like that 2007 to 2009, was our favorite time, and I wish that anybody who’s ever been in TNA, especially people who were there like 2014 2017 to now, I just wish everybody could have experienced 2007 and 2009 because they have no idea if they think they have good now,” said Love. “That’s great, but like, you’ve no idea how awesome it was.”
