Deonna Purrazzo discusses her WWE release, reveals ideal next move & more [Exclusive]

You faced a lot of big names, but is there anyone you're annoyed you didn't get to face in WWE?

Yeah, Nattie, of course! Hands down, she's like my dream match that is, like, realistic. Then I worked with Bayley once in NXT but I'd love to actually, as a part of the roster, get to do that and showcase myself a little bit more. Then, same with Sasha Banks. Those are three people that I admire and I think are amazing wrestlers, and I would really love it if, one day, that was possible to work with them.

My annoyance is we didn't see enough of VXT. You and Chelsea Green were even rumored to be on RAW as a team! Was that ever close to materializing?

Well, we were told in NXT that we would be debuting - from Triple H. He kind of asked us to brainstorm ideas for vignettes and backstage things, and this was right when NXT was going live. So, he was like, "You might not get the chance to be on TV every week in the ring, but if we can do backstage stuff or things that are done at home. Just come up with any and all ideas and shoot them to Creative."

We did that. We did that twice and we never heard anything back, and then it was that Chelsea was going to debut without me but I would come in when I was ready. I probably squashed that a little bit because I flipped out!

And I was kind of just like, "I've asked, for 18 months now, how I can be TV-ready and I'm finally getting an opportunity to be on TV and I'm not ready? That's on you, that's not on me. I am ready! You're just choosing me not to be." Then we ran into him again to get a call to go to RAW and we heard that it was potentially to do a tag match but nothing was ever confirmed, so, as far as been called up, we don't know. I think we just kind of took those opportunities, me with Asuka, her with Charlotte, and just killed them.

We impressed people at RAW, and we just kept being asked back. Obviously, there's like, like this [Deonna puts her fists together] with NXT and RAW, and people being called up. So we got brought back down to NXT and were told it wasn't meant to be a call-up, so that was just a lot of confusion I think on everyone's ends and what was happening with us, especially with myself and Chelsea - but, damn, I love VXT. She's, like, my real-life best friend and if I was going to be in a tag team and just have fun with anyone, it's 100% her, and I'm sad we didn't get to do anything with it.

Deonna Purrazzo and Chelsea Green Enter caption

Now, I know you love your tattoos - as do I. Everyone does fantasy booking with matches and, "Who do you want to face?" So, let's be different.

You can give any fellow wrestler a tattoo of your choosing. Who do you pick and what do they get?

Oh, my God. Oh, God... Okay, well, this kind of is like a real-life thing. I'm not going to answer your question at all - because I've no idea - but I have a funny story about it.

Toni Storm and I have matching tattoos.

Yeah, so we did Download Festival last June and, in the VIP section, they have a free tattoo booth. Basically, we were like, "Oh, we'll get tattooed, we'll get what we want," but they couldn't draw things just for the amount of people that wanted tattoos, so they had a board with just a generic whatever tattoos - like old school, really thick, chunky tattoos - so, on both ankles, we have a drunk duck that's holding a beer. So, I guess, fantasy-wise, we booked ourselves with these terrible tattoos!

Purrazzo and Storm have matching tattoos!