Andrew Ravens
Paige has opened up about the unlikely chain of events that led to her WWE return, revealing that Jelly Roll played a direct role in getting the conversation started and that Nick Khan laid out two non-negotiable conditions before any deal could move forward. Paige shared the details during a new episode of What’s Your Story with Stephanie McMahon.
The path back to WWE began at a live recording of Jelly Roll’s wife Bunnie’s podcast, where Paige was a guest alongside Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s agent Brad Slater. Jelly Roll used the moment to ask directly why WWE had not brought Paige back. That question set off a chain of events that led to a meeting with Nick Khan being arranged within 30 minutes of Jelly Roll making the call.
“I went and met him for about 10 minutes, great guy. Love him. Big fan of him. Super smart,” she said. “He’s got a business brain on him. I thought I’d be intimidated by him. But going in there, he’s easygoing. He goes, ‘Two things — your neck has to be okay and we have to do a drug test.’ I was like, ‘Fair enough.’ I was like, ‘Hey, I can control the drug test.’
“I’m clean as a whistle. And so I was like, ‘I don’t know how my neck’s been. It’s been a few years since I got it checked. The last time I got it checked, it was perfect. So I’m not really concerned about it.’ And so, the next week I fly to Birmingham.”
The drug test condition carried significant personal weight, given Paige’s history with the company. During her first stint in WWE, she failed two drug tests and, by her own admission, was “a bit of a mess.” Stephanie McMahon stated on the episode that there had been real concern for Paige within WWE at that time, and that when Paige first returned in 2017, Stephanie hugged her and told her she was glad she was still alive. Paige is now eight years sober.
Paige Getting Medically Cleared
The medical clearance side of the equation required a 10-hour appointment in Birmingham. Paige was medically disqualified from WWE in December 2017 after a match that revealed the severity of her neck issues, leading to her forced retirement from the company. She later returned to in-ring competition in AEW in 2022, but receiving formal WWE medical clearance was an entirely different process. When the results came back clean, she broke down.
“It was a couple of things. The fact that my neck was good,” Paige said. “And the last time I was in WWE, my neck wasn’t, and I had to retire. And I had to miss out on all these massive things like the Royal Rumble, Elimination Chamber, all these things I didn’t get to be a part of, even though I was part of the group that helped kind of ignite that, right? And it’s just the fact that I’m going to be okay.”
With both conditions met, Paige entered contract negotiations and was brought back in time for WrestleMania 42, where she teamed with Brie Bella to win the WWE Women’s Tag Team titles. Paige stepped in as a replacement for Nikki Bella, who suffered an ankle injury on the road to WrestleMania.
