Lita Reveals Vince McMahon's Response When She Wanted To Change Her WWE Retirement Angle
WWE Hall-of-Famers Trish Stratus and Lita recently sat down with Ring The Belle for an interview and discussed many topics. Among them, Lita and Stratus heavily focused on their respective retirements, with Stratus retiring in September of 2006 and Lita in November of the same year. Stratus and Lita admitted that the conclusions to their accomplished careers were indeed planned in sync and they gave further explanation as to why their retirement angles were booked so different from one another.
Lita first appeared on WWE TV in February of 2000 and Stratus, in March of 2000. Both women began their WWE careers only one month apart and would ultimately retire just two months apart after their final matches in 2006. Lita confirmed that this was planned between them.
"We've done it. It was [something we talked to each other about]. We achieved any goals and more," Lita confirmed.
Stratus retired from the ring after defeating Lita at WWE Unforgiven 2006. She retired as the reigning WWE Women's Champion and it would grant her a 7th, record-setting WWE Women's Championship. This is arguably a heroic end to a career that any superstar would want.
On the other hand, Lita would lose her retirement match and her WWE Women's Championship to Mickie James at WWE Survivor Series 2006. Following the match, former WWE superstars Shad Gaspard and JTG, better known as Cryme Tyme, would interrupt Lita's retirement speech to conduct a "ho sale", where they auctioned off items to the audience like Lita's Monistat, one of her sex toys, and even a pair of her panties to JBL. Lita begged for it to stop and looked mortified as she watched from inside the ring. Stratus and Lita discussed why the storylines leading up to their respective retirements were booked so different.
"I mean, I've always been the red-headed step child and it was not gonna end any different way. I was literally the red-headed, step child. It's ok," Lita said with a chuckle. "I've never been quiet about it. I was super uncool with it. I went up the chain. I went to the producers, I went to the writers, I went to Vince, I went back to the producers, back to the writers, back to Vince. It was a hard, 'no'."
Stratus would add, "Different characters, different storylines going in to it. Ours [Stratus'] was focused on our feud and on our rivalry as a babyface and you [Lita] retiring as a heel character."