AJ Lee & Nikki Bella Had Legitimate Beef In WWE, News On The Placement Of The Recent WWE TLC Match, JD McDonagh Returns

WWE Hall of Famer Nikki Garcia (Bella) recently reflected on how the heated feud between Charlotte Flair and Tiffany Stratton reminded her of her own rivalry with AJ Lee back in 2014.

Speaking on a recent episode of her “The Nikki & Brie Show,” Garcia discussed the now-infamous SmackDown segment from the Flair-Stratton WrestleMania build-up, which reportedly went off-script with the two women trading personal shots. She said,

“I’m not going to lie, AJ Lee and I did that quite a bit. We would throw things at each other on the mic that neither of us expected. It definitely made things feel more personal, but it also kept people invested in our story — and neither of us ever took it personally.”

She added, “Would we sometimes be bothered backstage? 100%. But we kept it very professional. Sometimes you have to get a little personal. Look at John and Cody — things got real between them, and fans were hooked. It even happened a bit with Tiffy and Naomi before Naomi’s story with Jade, and now with Tiffany and Charlotte. It helped set them all up for some incredible storylines.”

Last week’s episode of WWE SmackDown featured a TLC match for the WWE Tag Team Championships, and both Mark Henry and Bully Ray believe it was placed in the right spot rather than saving it for WrestleMania 41. Some online discussion suggested that the match — featuring the Street Profits, #DIY, and the Motor City Machine Guns — would have been better suited for WrestleMania 41. Bully Ray and Mark Henry addressed the debate during a recent episode of the “Busted Open Radio” podcast, and you can check out some highlights from the podcast below:

Mark Henry on whether the match should have been on the WrestleMania card: “No, not on WrestleMania. It wouldn’t have lived on WrestleMania, because of timing. The spot was better for where it was.”

Bully Ray on the match’s placement: “I can tell you now, definitively, that TLC match was better to have on Smackdown than it was at WrestleMania. 30 minutes for the whole thing, commercial free. Balls to the wall, do whatever you want, as opposed to WrestleMania, where there’s always the possibility that your time is going to get cut. Also, one of the big things that happened at TLC 2, at WrestleMania 17, was the match was so damn good, it wasn’t followable. And how do I know this? Because the guy that was in the main event, Stone Cold Steve Austin, told me to my face. He’s like ‘S**t Bubba, we were last and we couldn’t follow it.’ So it’s probably smart.”

JD McDonagh made his return to action on this week’s episode of WWE RAW.

Teaming up with Finn Balor, McDonagh faced off against The War Raiders (Erik and Ivar). Despite their efforts, The War Raiders secured the victory, thanks in part to interference from PENTA.

During the match, McDonagh executed a springboard moonsault, this time landing it on the ramp side rather than the announce table side — the latter being where he suffered his injury earlier this year.

This bout marked McDonagh’s first appearance since sustaining a punctured lung on the January 27th episode of WWE RAW.

JD McDonagh vuelve a hacer ese Moonsault ante los War Raiders, como el que le lesionó ante las mesas… y hoy sale bien. #WWERAW pic.twitter.com/ONIJu4ckpl

— LuigiWrestling (@LuigiWrestling) April 29, 2025