It’s been more than a year since Tay Conti debuted in AEW. The former judoka cemented her place in the division after a string of powerful performances, including a brilliant match against the women’s champion. However, her release from WWE wasn’t as smooth as she would’ve hoped for.

Tay Conti details her last days in WWE

Every superstar WWE releases has the chance to succeed in AEW. Case in point, Jon Moxley; left WWE an afterthought and became the best wrestler in the world within a year. Look at the likes of Matt Hardy, FTR, Chris Jericho and Miro, all of whom are killing it in AEW.

As for Tay, WWE did not want to lose her to AEW but not because of her potential. On the AEW Unrestricted podcast, the former #1 contender for the AEW Women’s Championship revealed how WWE specifically told her they didn’t want her to join AEW.

“I was asking for my release for a couple of months, I was not happy. I was so unhappy there that I didn’t have any [backup] plans, I was just like, ‘I want to get out of here. I’m not happy.’ I never thought about, ‘What am I gonna do if they give me my release? I never thought about it. I was like, ‘I just need to be done with them.’ (H/T Fightful Wrestling)

“Of course, they said no a couple of times. We had a bunch of meetings. I was like, ‘Nope, I’m just done. Please let me go.’ So at the last one, they told me, ‘No, you’re not going,’ and they mentioned AEW. I remember they told me, ‘No, you’re not gonna go to AEW. [We’ve invested a lot of money in you.]”

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WWE offered to pay her to stay home

In a more shocking turn of events, WWE offered to pay Tay Conti to stay home instead of wrestling. It is probably the most desperate move WWE has attempted to keep a potential Superstar from leaving the company. Unfortunately, their plans did not work, and they released Conti in 2020.

“I’m like, ‘Yes, you guys don’t use me here. So I’ve got to go somewhere, but it’s not there. I know nobody there. I have no plans to go to AEW.’ I had no plans because I had no contacts at all. At the end of the day, we figured it out. They said no, and I still had two years in my contract. I was like, well, [what can I do?] I’m gonna be here. They told me, ‘Okay, you can be at home. We’re going to pay you. You can be at home.”

In April 2020, Tay Conti was out of WWE and made her AEW debut in August 2020. She’s now one of the top female talents in the world and may someday hold the AEW Women’s Championship.

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