Zayda Steel is ready for an Uprising.
Following the success of its first-ever all-women’s show, DREAMWAVE Wrestling announced the launch of a new sister promotion called Uprising: Women Athletes. Much like DREAMWAVE’s inaugural Uprising event, Uprising: Women Athletes aims to exclusively spotlight women in wrestling. As such, the new promotion is now set to host Uprising 2 on Friday, April 19.
WrestleZone’s Ella Jay spoke with “The Real Deal” Zayda Steel ahead of the Uprising 2 event. There, Steel and Maggie Lee will face ROH’s Billie Starkz and the DREAMWAVE Women’s Champion Brittnie Brooks in tag team competition. Steel, of course, is no stranger to Brooks, as the two remain fierce rivals both in and outside of the DREAMWAVE banner. Billie Starkz, on the other hand, will be a first-time opponent for Steel.
When asked about her thoughts heading into this match, Steel expressed admiration for Starkz, who also recently became the first-ever ROH Women’s TV Champion. Given that she’s paired with Brooks, though, Steel’s favor for Starkz has slightly diminished.
“Billie, I’ll give her all the praise of the world. She’s killing it for as young as she is on AEW [and ROH]. Billie, she’s a star, but she messed up teaming up with Brittnie Brooks now,” Steel said. “Now I just don’t like her. I don’t like her. I mean, come on, Brittnie clearly paid you. It’s fine, it’s fine. You could have talked to me. I have more money, but it’s whatever.”
“As much as I love DREAMWAVE, as much as I praised Jay, who runs DREAMWAVE, I’m questioning this booking decision,” Steel continued. “Why on earth are you going to have a tag match? Especially me tagging with Maggie, who has been ignoring me. I’ve been trying to text her, trying to DM her to try to come up with some game plan, but she’s ghosting me. It’s interesting that we’re tagging in the main event — because The Real Deal always needs to be in the main event — the night before our triple threat match. So if Brittnie was smart, she won’t tag in and just have Billie do all the work.”
Championship Rematch
As Steel alluded to, this tag team bout will precede a major title match slated to take place the following night at DREAMWAVE’s Anniversary IX show. On that occasion, Brittnie Brooks will defend the DREAMWAVE Women’s Championship against Maggie Lee and Steel. For Brooks, this will mark her fourth title defense. For Lee and Steel, this will serve as a rematch, as both were unsuccessful in their previous attempts to capture the title.
“It would mean redemption [to win the DREAMWAVE Women’s Championship],” Steel said. “As historic as our championship bout was [at the Follow Your Heart event], as great as it was, up until I lost. That match, that loss, has been in the back of my head every single day since. I wrestle every weekend. I just wrestled last week at Wrestling Open, and every time I’m out there, people are like, ‘Oh my God, I watched your match with Brittnie Brooks. It was really good.'”
“In the back of my head like, ‘Oh, it was a good match, but I lost,’ it would just mean that redemption so everyone could shut up. I am better than Brittnie and Maggie, but mainly Brittnie, so I have a lot to prove. Obviously, Brittnie wants to retain, but I feel like I got royally embarrassed that night. So I feel like I need it more than anything.”
Watch our full interview with Zayda Steel below:
RELATED: Zayda Steel Recalls Important Character Advice She Received From Gisele Shaw
