Like John Cena, fans have long had something of a love/hate relationship with Charlotte Flair. Following a hiatus from the company, she returned to WWE at this year's Royal Rumble and ultimately managed to win the match.
Many fans were unhappy to see her receive another push straight into the main event, and it took pretty much no time at all for crowds to turn on The Queen. With that, WWE had no choice but to pivot by turning Flair heel (Tiffany Stratton, meanwhile, became a babyface as fans rallied around the rising star).
The writing was on the wall, and at WrestleMania in Las Vegas, Stratton successfully retained the WWE Women's Championship by defeating Flair.
In a new interview, Flair opened up on what went wrong with her latest babyface run and shared her hopes to eventually win fans over again.
"Before I got injured, I was really in a groove being a good guy. [I] really enjoyed it," she explained. "I was really getting that ‘good guy reaction’ on live events. And it was like the first time in my career that I felt like comfortable as a good guy. I just went with it, I loved it and I was digging it."
"Then I got hurt and when I came back, and how I came back," Flair continued. "Obviously winning the Rumble twice isn’t like — and I don’t mean this in a bad way — but you don’t want the Yankees to always win, you know what I mean? So that is harder to gain that sympathy, that good guy feel."
"But I do hope later down the road that I can transition back into that because I really do enjoy seeing the kids," she added. "And that’s what it’s all about, right? It’s the fan interaction, and if it wasn’t for you guys, we’d be out of business."
During last night's SmackDown, Flair finally relented and formed a tag team with Alexa Bliss. It's hard to say whether this is the beginning of the end of her time as a heel, but the unique pairing does appear to be one that fans are eager to get behind.
You can hear more from The Queen in the player below.