Zelina Vega reveals ideas for her hardcore match against Chelsea Green that were turned down by WWE

As seen during the June 6th 2025 edition of WWE Smackdown, United States women’s champion Zelina Vega defeated Piper Niven in a “Bakersfield Brawl” match. While speaking to the Lightweights podcast, Zelina reflected on the match…

“My first hardcore match ever. I was like, ‘Oh, can I jump off the tron?’ They’re just like, ‘No, no you can’t. We still need to save some oohs and aahs for Money In The Bank and you need to just live, you know?’ Eventually, I’m going to do it. I was a huge Jeff Hardy mark when I was a kid, like ridiculous. So, anything that he’s done, I just like, ‘I want to do that at some point.'”

“They set up some of the ladders and I was like ‘can I use the ladders, can I jump off the ladders’ and they were like ‘no because we need to like save some of it for tomorrow.’ Like I want to make this really good and just see how we can make it different. I was like ‘can we like put barbwire on a chancla’ and they’re like ‘No. No blood, no guts just just take it easy.'”