Would Deonna Purrazzo still be in TNA today?
After the 30-year-old was surprisingly released from WWE in 2020, Purrazzo made her mark in TNA/Impact Wrestling by immediately winning the Knockouts Championship in her very first match at Slammiversary.
Throughout her three-year stint, Purrazzo would end up winning the knockouts title on three different occasions. She was treated as a top star in the promotion, so it was a genuine shock when Deonna made her way over to AEW in 2024.
During her recent interview on the Lightweights Podcast with Joe Vulpis, Purrazzo revealed that Impact didn't make her offer to stay at first.
“It’s funny because I’ve seen a lot of misconception about this (how Purrazzo got AEW offer), and I’ve talked openly about talking to AEW while I was ending my IMPACT contract and I got permission from Scott D’Amore like 90 days out. So the beginning of October, I was like, ‘Hey, you have not spoke to me about renewing my contract. Is it okay?... I don’t know anything about contract tampering. I don’t want to contract tamper. I don’t want to do anything the wrong way. I respect you, I respect this company so much.
Tell me the right way to go about this. You have not spoke to me about re-signing. Is it okay for me to go try to talk to AEW? Or WWE?’ And he was like, ‘Absolutely,’ and he was like, ‘I think that you’re not talking about doing things now... You’re talking about starting January 1st when you would technically be free so, go talk to whoever you wanna talk to.’”
Purrazzo goes into further detail about the company waiting to the very last minute to make an offer. The former Knockouts Champion felt that she poured her and soul into her Impact run and was “bummed” that their attempt to keep her was so late.
"Yes. Like I -- yes and no (Purrazzo responded when asked if she was hurt by IMPACT/TNA not making the effort to re-sign her). So, earlier, my contract at IMPACT was originally two years and it had a third-year option that was their option. So at the end of that two-year mark, I had said, ‘I don’t know if this place is for me. Maybe I wanna explore other things. I know it’s your choice but respectfully, could you not take that third-year option?’ And at first, they were like, ‘You can go talk and explore and whatever but we’ll let you know’ and then they picked up the third-year option, which honestly, I’m very thankful for. I think it all worked out the way it should have and I wasn’t upset by that.
But when it came to renewing my contract and getting a completely new one, yeah, I was bummed because I just felt like I gave so much heart and soul and 100 percent of me to this company to be -- you know, I was Ms. IMPACT Wrestling for three and a half years so, why wouldn’t you wanna keep me? And it wasn’t until last minute… like the end of November that they were like, ‘No! We do wanna keep you’ and I was kind of already like, hmm, but now I don’t think I want to stay. It was just a very weird -- I felt like why wouldn’t you wanna keep me? But also, do you not wanna keep me because you thought I wanted to leave? It was a weird communication, honestly. But yeah, I was upset."