Nia Jax‘s appearance in the men’s Royal Rumble match provided some memorable moments in the marathon 2019 Royal Rumble pay-per-view.

Jax’s spots with Randy Orton in the Rumble, and her followup with Dean Ambrose on Monday’s Raw have raised the question of whether or not WWE is considering promoting intergender matches, something that they have shied away from.

One WWE Hall of Famer, Jim Ross, and a future HOF inductee, Sean Waltman, both discussed Jax’s Rumble inclusion, and what it might mean, on their podcasts this week.

Good Ol’ JR expressed a more nuanced opinion on the subject, praising Jax’s spot in the Rumble, while expressing his preference for it not to become the norm.

“I enjoyed the little wrinkle, if that’s all it’s going to be, of Nia Jax entering the men’s Royal Rumble,” Ross said.

“Didn’t have a problem with that, philosophically, for the moment, for a spot. I hope that doesn’t lead to a proliferation of intergender matches.”

Ross then made clear that his take is his own, and that he holds nothing against those that enjoy intergender matches.

“Those of you that do intergender matches, or like them, look, that’s cool with me, man. I don’t care,” Ross said. “But for me, if I’m booking, if I’m creating, if I’m writing, I’m not putting women and men against each other.”

Ross explained further.

“How I feel about that is kind of the expression I saw in Randy Orton’s face when he went face to face with Nia Jax,” said Ross. “That was a good moment. She got some shine. I just don’t want it going forward in an intergender rivalry. The women always have to wrestle smaller guys, who are comedy characters to some degree.”

“That’s not how I would produce wrestling.”


For his part, Sean Waltman had a slightly different take.

“I thought it was great. I f—ing loved it,” said Waltman.


Still, Waltman acknowledges that he understands why some critics take issue with WWE doing intergender violence.

“There are people that want to be accepting, but there’s a thing where it’s going to take a little bit to get used to,” said Waltman. “You can’t fault people for the feelings that come up when they see certain things.”

“Sometimes these things can bring up stuff within ourselves that we might not be comfortable with from our past and how we’ve been to women,” Waltman said.

“So there can be different reasons for people feeling a certain kind of way about this thing.”