Trish Stratus Explains Rejecting Past WWE Offer To Return, Wanting Latest Run To Be Different

Trish Stratus won’t return to the pro wrestling world for any old reason.

She must deliver “Stratus-faction.”

During a recent Inside The Ropes interview, the WWE Hall of Fame legend explained why she turned down an offer to return to WWE back in 2009, as well as how she wanted her return to the company last year in 2023 to be different.

Featured below are some of the highlights from the interview where she touches on these topics with her thoughts.

On why she rejected a past offer to return to WWE back in 2009: “I always said when I retired, if I go back, it’s got to be for something important. Not important, that’s not the right word. It’s got to be for something that’s good. No, that’s not right either. It’s gotta be just something that has to check a few boxes. I want to work with someone I haven’t worked with before. Selfishly as a performer I want to challenge myself. But I also want to elevate another person. I want to do stuff that hasn’t been done before. I want to present things a bit differently. I just thought about coming back after being retired, I didn’t think that was a good platform to do it. I didn’t think it was necessary. I don’t think it would have been way better if Trish Stratus was in there.”

On wanting her return to WWE last year in 2023 to be different: “I felt like I’d done the babyface comeback. They’re fine, but I don’t want to wear out my welcome. I said, if I go back, I’d like to surprise people and do it a little differently. I thought as a performer, I would like to challenge myself and do a heel run because I hadn’t touched that for so many years. It was 18 years since I did a heel promo. So Becky called me and said, “Do you want to come back and do a match with me at WrestleMania?” But we needed me to come back and turn first. We were spitballing how I could turn heel and then we brought in Lita. We thought it’d be cool to see me turning on Lita. You’re more invested in me turning on my friend of 20 years than me and Becky, who had no television history at that point. I was supposed to come in for a little bit after WrestleMania, do a little something. And then suddenly I was in a storyline every single week for the next six months. So we were not expecting that but that’s what happened.”

Check out the complete interview at ITRWrestling.com.