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From being in the Riott Squad to becoming WWE Women's Champion. Watch how Liv Morgan rose to the top to become one of WWE's biggest heels.
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#livmorgan #rhearipley #dominikmysterio #wwe #wrestling #sportskeedawrestling
From being in the Riott Squad to becoming WWE Women's Champion. Watch how Liv Morgan rose to the top to become one of WWE's biggest heels.
You can also visit our site: https://www.sportskeeda.com/wwe
#livmorgan #rhearipley #dominikmysterio #wwe #wrestling #sportskeedawrestling
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SportsTranscript
00:00Liv Morgan is red hot in 2024. She's been up there as one of the most relevant
00:05superstars in all of wrestling and nobody is talking about it enough. It
00:09isn't just that she's been the pinnacle of the women's division for some time now,
00:12it's how she went about getting into that position. Despite the lies, the
00:17cheating, the manipulation, her character has had to take a long road to get where
00:24she is now. So exactly how did Liv Morgan become one of WWE's top bad girls? Join us
00:33as we take a deep dive into how Liv Morgan got to where she is. This is
00:38Sportskeeda Wrestling, I'm Kevin Kellum. Why don't you hit the like button and let
00:42us know what you think of Liv Morgan in the comments below. You think you know
00:47all the wrestling stories? There's more you haven't heard yet. Join us on
00:52Backstage Pass. Liv Morgan has been with WWE for a decade now. She didn't get too
00:59much notoriety during her early days in WWE NXT, the developmental brand of WWE,
01:05but it was not hard to see why. NXT during her tenure between late 2014 and
01:10late 2017 was a highly competitive landscape with a women's division that
01:15featured huge names, generational headliners in Sasha Banks, Charlotte
01:20Flair, Bayley, Becky Lynch, Asuka, and many more. Liv Morgan wasn't exactly a
01:25veteran at that point, so it was always going to be very challenging to stand
01:30out. But she's an example of how success in NXT doesn't necessarily guarantee
01:35success making your way up to the main roster of Raw and SmackDown. There wasn't
01:40really too much of note in her NXT run because she was really just developing
01:44in the background while others got the spotlight. The TV time she had served
01:48more as preparation for that big stage and it served its purpose. The fact that
01:54it took her nearly two years from her WWE signing to get a singles victory
02:00should tell you how challenging, as we mentioned, challenging her NXT run was.
02:05But in late 2017, her career trajectory would really racket up a big change as
02:12she was called up to the main roster as part of a group known then as the Riot
02:17Squad, involving a true veteran in the independent ranks, Ruby Riott and Sarah
02:22Logan. The first full year was all about establishing herself on the main roster
02:26with this crew of rabble-rousers who were all about disruption. And this was a
02:32pretty young Liv Morgan in her early 20s. By being one of the more experienced
02:36people in the group, Ruby Riott and Sarah Logan would be able to develop Liv
02:41Morgan and their close friendships would really make some fun chemistry for them
02:46on television. And they got a fair share of TV time. The Riott Squad weren't
02:50exactly going to go down in history as maybe one of the best factions, but
02:54certainly one that had carved out their own following within the WWE fan base.
02:59But looking back at it, the biggest injustice that group may have faced was
03:03that Ruby Riott didn't benefit as much as she should have as a veteran, as
03:07someone who came into WWE with some significant hype. Either way, Liv Morgan
03:11would end up riding with the Riott Squad until 2019 with the Superstar
03:15Shake-Up when she shifted to SmackDown and ended her ties with that change. It
03:21wasn't the launching pad that everyone had hoped for as she developed her own
03:25individual fan base in the Riott Squad, turning into a good guy for the first
03:29time, or a good gal, on the main roster. The fact that Liv Morgan was the final
03:34pick of the WWE draft when that brand split resumed in late 2019 should kind
03:39of signal where she ranked amongst the talent overall top to bottom in WWE. But
03:45Liv Morgan, just like Carmella three years before, proved that the final pick
03:50is not a status that truly determines your future worth, that isn't a curse
03:54you may think it is on paper. She got her first significant spotlight on
03:58television when she returned on the final Raw of the 2010s to inject
04:03herself into that god-awful, yeah, like, talk show-like storyline between Bobby
04:10Lashley, Lana, and Rusev. Yeah. Just imagine from being as the final pick of
04:15the draft, she was just in the big surprise return role in one of the more
04:19notable, not for the right reason, storylines of the 2010s. Yeah, that was a
04:24pretty scandalous storyline and, uh, you know, really kind of pushed the needle of what
04:29WWE was trying to do, but they tried. But unfortunately, it didn't really go
04:33anywhere. That's right, we would have had Lana and Liv in a love quadrangle. I don't
04:40know, it was confusing. It did make sense for Liv to face off with her former
04:44Riott Squad leader in Ruby Riott, a brief feud where Liv Morgan really won almost
04:50all of the significant matches in the little program. A little after that, Ruby
04:54Riott successfully saw that, hey, let's get the band back together. Yes, a Riott
04:58Squad reunion, which some Liv-faithful fans at the time felt was a step back.
05:03Maybe she was supposed to be a single star, but the Riott Squad was back
05:08together. The most significant part of this reunion, and a pretty big one, was
05:12Liv Morgan getting the spotlight on the main card of WrestleMania 37. Yes, her
05:18first WrestleMania, where her team competed for the women's tag team
05:22titles. But when Ruby Riott was released just two months later, it seemingly felt
05:27like a never-ending list of WWE cuts was happening. Morgan was on her own
05:33again, surviving that round of cuts, and her group was broken up once again. Still,
05:38something had to change. When her alliance ended with Riott a second time,
05:43Morgan was much more noticeable, standing out as a performer who the fans were
05:48starting to get behind. When she competed in the 2021 Money in the Bank women's
05:53ladder match, she was the sentimental favorite of the crowd. You could hear the
05:58reactions getting louder for her every week, and it was all organic. After the
06:03Riott Squad, it was all about Liv Morgan moving to her own pace. At 27 years old,
06:09she was in a great position at the right time, and the powers that be in WWE
06:14simply noticed the organic reaction she was getting. Despite not becoming Miss
06:19Money in the Bank in 2021, she was quickly making a name for herself as one
06:24of the fastest rising stars in WWE's women's division. People wanted to see
06:29Liv, and they wanted to see her become Women's Champion. She started to flirt
06:34with the Raw Women's Championship picture, and took the normal route of
06:38being the youngster who failed multiple times to win the big one against veteran
06:42names, who in this case was The Man Becky Lynch. As the months rolled on, she found
06:48herself getting spots in major cards, pay-per-view cards, premium live events,
06:52continuing to make appearances in the Women's Royal Rumble, participating in
06:56the Women's Elimination Chamber match, and then teaming up with another rising
07:00star in Rhea Ripley to challenge for the Women's Tag Team Titles at Wrestlemania
07:0538. Liv was constantly in the mix, but she was never THE focus. Although she was
07:11constantly losing the big ones each time, it felt like she was getting closer and
07:15closer. The much bigger, physically daunting Rhea Ripley would turn on the
07:21smaller Liv Morgan not long after their alliance was formed, starting what might
07:26go down as a generational feud for the women's division, but maybe more on that
07:29later. The one-month alliance alone managed to set the tone for the rivalry
07:34for the next couple of years down the line. Yeah, we will get to it, we will get
07:38to it. If you notice the tone of her story up to this point, you'll see that
07:42Liv Morgan's career went from being a relatively unnoticed rookie in NXT, to a
07:47newcomer on the main roster with two mentors taking her under wing, to setting
07:52off on her own journey and facing setback after setback after setback,
07:56chasing her dreams but never getting that truly refined golden victory. Her
08:03authenticity made her likable, and it's not hard to see why fans would get behind
08:07someone like her, who before wrestling truly beat the odds just to get to the
08:11WWE. She had the duality of giving off that girl next door vibe, but also having
08:16a whole lot of sass and flair to go with it. Still dealing with her heart
08:20shattered in pieces at the hands of Rhea Ripley, it made sense for her to join AJ
08:25Styles and Finn Balor in their fight against the Judgment Day, the new baddie
08:30faction which Rhea Ripley was a part of with Damian Priest and a now evil Edge.
08:36Who the heck could have predicted that Liv Morgan would be a part of such a
08:40group? She may have failed in taking out the JD, but she managed to pin Rhea
08:45Ripley in a singles match, which was pretty significant because Rhea would go
08:50on to have a streak of not getting pinned for over almost two years before
08:55she was pinned again, and fittingly it was Liv who would do that. Enough
08:59fluctuating between timelines, in 2022 it looked like it was going to be Liv
09:05Morgan's year. Seeing how great the responses were for her at the Money in
09:10the Bank in 2021, WWE decided to pull the trigger and have her join Carmella,
09:15Alexa Bliss, Bayley, Asuka, and Nikki ASH in winning the Money in the Bank women's
09:22ladder match. Yeah, she got the contract that would allow her to cash in and get
09:27a title shot anywhere, anytime she wanted. They were finally saying it was Liv's
09:32time and she was gonna get a guaranteed opportunity to push herself into the
09:37title picture. She also joined them to keep the women's record 100% as she
09:43successfully cashed in on Ronda Rousey in shocking fashion to become the
09:48Smackdown Women's Champion. Yeah, that all happened in one night for little miss
09:54Liv Morgan. This was a breakthrough moment for Liv Morgan. She defeated one
09:59of the most certified badass women in the history of WWE, the long road as
10:04Michael Cole proclaimed it from Elmwood Park, New Jersey, had really come to a
10:09big point. Ideally this should have been a defining moment in her career and to
10:14some point it was, but the circumstances that were outside of her control meant
10:18she was gonna have to face other hurdles that only champions have to face. Morgan
10:23would not have a clearly defined strong run at first with the title, managing to
10:28drag it out and get a kind of returning conflict with Ronda Rousey at SummerSlam
10:34where she would pin the former UFC champion while controversially tapping
10:38out at the same time. A dusty finish if you will. They gave her the image of, yeah
10:43she's having the title, but is she really the champion until Ronda Rousey gets it
10:48back. That was the impression some fans had. Yeah, the internet makes some things
10:53into an opinion, then they say they're fact, but that's what the talk was. After
10:57a successful title defense against Shayna Baszler at the Clash of the
11:01Champions, Ronda Rousey came knocking once more, emerging as the number one
11:05contender and beating Morgan in an extreme rules match, putting an end to a
11:10rather underwhelming title reign in the eyes of many who thought that Morgan
11:14could really run with it. Liv was still quite popular at the time, but maybe WWE
11:18felt it made sense to highlight Ronda Rousey, a legitimate sports star, since
11:23she was the one getting the big bucks anyway. That's just what people said
11:27online, so it has to be true, right? It wasn't back to zero, but it was
11:30certainly back in line for Liv Morgan. In the 2023 Women's Royal Rumble, she was
11:35able to find her way into the multi-woman fray and heal an old wound
11:40from Rumble's past in 2019, where she was eliminated, yes, with the fastest
11:46woman's elimination in a Royal Rumble match. She wasn't in there long back in
11:502019, but 2023 was a different story. She was the runner-up to her former rival,
11:56former tag team partner, yeah, the one who broke her heart, Rhea Ripley, but she
12:02managed to last for a whopping one hour and 67 seconds, which was one second short
12:08of Rhea Ripley, who had the longest time in the Women's Rumble match. Yeah, back at
12:13it with Rhea Ripley. Once again, we'll get to that part. Historically, being the
12:18runner-up in the Royal Rumble means you get to do something significantly in
12:22the mid-card region in the road to WrestleMania, and some feel that Liv
12:25Morgan rejoining the tag team ranks may not have been that, but that doesn't mean
12:29that they weren't trying to do something special, pairing her once again with a
12:33powerhouse and Raquel Rodriguez, adding some fire to the women's tag team
12:38division by winning the titles from the mega powers of Becky Lynch and Trish
12:43Stratus on Raw in April of 2023. The yo-yo would go up with Liv Morgan coming
12:49back from an attack at the hands of Ronda Rousey and Shayna Baszler to
12:52regain the titles. That's something her and Rodriguez got to do, but the yo-yo
12:56would go down, suffering yet another untimely shoulder injury, leading to her
13:02and Raquel to lose the titles to Chelsea Green and Sonya Deville. Rhea Ripley
13:08viciously assaulted Morgan to write her off TV for another extensive period of
13:15time, and this was another continuation of their on-and-off story that would
13:20change Liv Morgan's character forever. The yo-yo had to stop. That pace had to
13:26end for Morgan. She had to settle into a lane, and she did, returning at the
13:31Women's Royal Rumble in 2024, and was once more the runner-up with a deserving
13:38Bayley getting her moment. But it was another bittersweet moment, and it began
13:45a story of Liv Morgan once again never being able to win an unfiltered, pristine
13:52golden moment. Yeah, there always had to be an asterisk involved. Even when she
13:58did get the big one on that occasion in 2022, you knew there was just something
14:03there. There was another huge chip added to the massive chunk already on her
14:07shoulder. Liv Morgan wasn't just back to lose another big match. No, she would once
14:13again have a WrestleMania road pulled out from underneath her, with Becky Lynch
14:18and Rhea Ripley getting a big spotlight for the Women's World title in
14:21Philadelphia at WrestleMania 40. But don't worry, Liv Morgan had a plan. She
14:28was seeking more than just a title. She was seeking all of it, and she was
14:34seeking it with revenge on her mind. At this point, Rhea Ripley became one of
14:39wrestling's hottest superstars. Regardless of her gender, she was
14:43probably one of the top five Googled names in wrestling. I don't know, but you
14:47know what we're getting at. And to get a match against her at WrestleMania 40
14:51would have been huge. It wouldn't have just meant something special for Morgan,
14:55but for her character and her mission, and she was left off the card entirely.
15:00Something we imagine that, you know, any Liv Morgan fan wasn't that happy about.
15:05But her time was coming, and it was coming closer than expected. Like I said,
15:10revenge was on her mind. Fresh off a big victory at WrestleMania 40, Rhea Ripley,
15:17purple black, dusted with joy in her post-WrestleMania glow on Monday at Raw,
15:23Liv Morgan would attack her from behind, legitimately injuring her, forcing
15:28Ripley this time to vacate a title, her Women's World Championship. That's
15:33right. Liv had Rhea lose a title without being in a title match, a championship
15:39that she won at WrestleMania 39 more than a year before. Rhea Ripley's title
15:45reign ended in a bittersweet moment, but now the bitterness was injected into her
15:51by her former tag team partner, who she had betrayed before. So sorry, sorry,
15:56Rhea. Karma's a b****. That was a lightning in a bottle moment that looked
16:01like it was going to put Liv Morgan in the driver's seat to become the Women's
16:06World Champion. No, yes, this is finally it. But that's not what happened. Not
16:11immediately, at least. Yes, the wrestling internet purists would freak out when a
16:16battle royal took place to crown a new Women's World Champion. Liv Morgan looked
16:20like she was finally going to have her moment. Fans were deflated when Becky
16:25Lynch got that title. Yes. And Liv Morgan was the runner up once again.
16:31Now, Becky Lynch makes sense. She's the man. She's super popular. It's a mix. It
16:35makes a lot of sense. But when you have fickle, fickle fans who say, give me
16:39what I want. Give me what I want. I want it now. Well, that lends itself to a
16:44continued emotional payoff. We'll get to the payoff. Fans on social media got out
16:50their virtual pitchforks and their digital gavels and started shouting that
16:54Becky was Becky Hogan, alluding to her having some backstage strings to pull
16:58like Hollywood Hulk Hogan to become the champion. I mean, I heard it on Twitter.
17:03Or actually, it's got to be true, right? It's not. Stop it. And these fans look
17:07silly when Becky Lynch, a true professional, was a transitional champion.
17:13Yes, turns out having Liv Morgan beating an established legend meant a lot more
17:19than just winning a battle royal on TV. Yeah. Who would have thought that Becky
17:24Lynch, the woman who used her backstage power to create an eight month
17:28storyline where she lost to Bianca Belair at WrestleMania 38, would be a
17:33giving person because she is. And she gave to Liv in a big way. Liv Morgan was
17:39the ultimate beneficiary of this. And that's when the Dominic Mysterio element
17:44came in. When Liv Morgan was set to face Becky Lynch for the Women's World
17:48Championship in Saudi Arabia, Dominic Mysterio appeared out of nowhere, saying
17:53that he would be there to keep her from getting the title that Rhea lost, except
17:58his involvement in the match would actually help Liv win the title. Or at
18:04least it appeared like it wasn't supposed to be a part of the plan. It
18:07made a lot of sense because her mommy, his mommy, Rhea Ripley, was out injured
18:13and the story was maintained of her eventually coming back to get back at
18:17Liv Morgan. But Dominic's interference ended up backfiring. And yeah, he helped
18:22her win the world title. This time it wasn't just about the championship glory
18:25for Liv Morgan. It was pure vengeance. She wasn't just gonna take the title that
18:30Rhea lost. No, she was gonna take everything that Rhea loved. Mind you, she
18:35wasn't officially a bad guy completely at this point. From her point of view, she
18:40thought she was doing the good thing. Yes, the best villains are the ones who think
18:44they're heroes in their own story. Again, we'd like to remind you that in this
18:48story, Rhea Ripley was responsible for Liv Morgan being out of action for half
18:52a year. So once again, let me remind you, karma is a bitch, yes. So it wasn't enough
18:58that she took time away from Rhea Ripley's career. It was about doing a whole lot
19:03more and taking Dom Dom and everything that was Rhea's empire away from her
19:08while she sat on the shelf and rehabbed from injury. A few nights after she won
19:13the title, Liv Morgan had to defend it against a enraged Becky Lynch inside a
19:18steel cage who invoked her rematch clause. But inside those same steel cages
19:23where you feel like outside elements would be neutralized, Dominic Mysterio
19:27once again tried to tamper with the outcome. Karma came back in the form of a
19:32six-foot-eight monster in a comical moment as Braun Strowman, who was going
19:37after the Judgment Day, bulldozed into Dominic Mysterio, whose body flimsily
19:42went up against the steel cage door that was open, smashing into Becky Lynch, who
19:47was about to escape the cage. Becky was just a second away from winning her
19:50title back, but this would directly lead to Liv Morgan escaping the cage,
19:55SLEEZING her way out and retaining the Women's World Championship under some
20:00dirty, dirty circumstances. And then there was the kiss. Yes, it wasn't just, I'm
20:07gonna take your title, or I'm just gonna take your little buddy and make him my
20:11ringside pal. No, I'm gonna take your man. That's right. She made her affections
20:15towards Dominic known with a big smooch. Yeah, that's when the story began to
20:21pick up in a big way, because people are shocked. Whoa! Sexual innuendos! On the
20:28surface, Dominic Mysterio wanted to make it clear that his Judgment Day members,
20:32especially Damian Priest, that he wasn't interested. I'm not into her. I'm
20:36waiting for mommy to come back. But when it came time to set his boundaries
20:40straight and let Liv Morgan know that Rhea Ripley was his lady, he couldn't do
20:45it. The consequences of his actions came immediately after he pinned his father,
20:51Rey Mysterio, for the first time. His father, Rey Mysterio, who whipped his hide
20:56at WrestleMania 39. Now he was finally getting revenge on his dad, and the
21:00person who helped him do that was Liv Morgan. Yeah, she was on top of him. What?
21:06What? What? What? Scandalous? Rhea Ripley returned, and both of them looked like they were caught in the act.
21:13Yes, all the soap opera. It's just dripping off the screen. This time, Liv
21:18Morgan had everything planned to a villainous revenge-filled tea, and it was
21:23spilling everywhere. Well, Dominic had to make Liv Morgan cry by telling her in
21:28front of Rhea the following week on Raw that the world, everyone watching, that he
21:33didn't want anything to do with her, and he cussed her out in Spanish, and she turned
21:37away with her crocodile tears. Oh, it was all just a big phony ruse. A ruse, I say.
21:46At SummerSlam 2024 in Cleveland, Ohio, Rhea Ripley was seeking revenge, and she
21:53was seeking to regain her title. So the stage was set once again for Rhea Ripley
21:58to get her own revenge, to get her title back, with her Dom-Dom at her side,
22:04entering Cleveland, Ohio, with Liv Morgan across the ring defending the title this
22:11time. And at last, Dominic truly revealed his true colors. He was directly
22:19responsible for Rhea Ripley losing the match, and then the final dagger of
22:25betrayal was made. She took Dominic Mysterio away from Rhea Ripley. That's
22:32right. He's not your Dirty Dom anymore. No, no, no. This was one of those big WWE
22:39angles that you saw coming miles away, but you didn't care because you just
22:43couldn't take your eyes off of it. Later that same night, within the Judgment Day
22:48rings, which were once the faction built around Rhea Ripley, Finn Balor cost
22:53another member of the group, Damien Priest, his world title match. Two nights
22:57later, Liv Morgan became a part of the Judgment Day. She put Rhea on the shelf.
23:02She took Rhea's title. She took Rhea's man. Now she took Rhea's group. She took
23:09everything. Liv Morgan's favorite song around this time may as well been
23:13Chaperone's My Kink is Karma, because she was getting pretty kinky. In the process
23:18of all of this, the Women's World Champion Liv Morgan, with revenge in her
23:23sneering eyes, truly became the most despicable figure in WWE's women's
23:29division. But when you take a closer look, she never hid her intentions of
23:34revenge. She said, I'm on a revenge tour, and the tour really ran through Rhea
23:40Ripley country. Does it make her less of a villain? Not really, but at least she's
23:44a consistent one. Like I said, the best villains are the ones who think they're
23:48the heroes. This time around, there was no doubting just how much she deserved to
23:53be world champion. Unlike two years before, she wasn't going to be a
23:57placeholder. She seized her moment using consistent character growth, great
24:03execution and production from multiple players, and a lot of support from WWE's
24:08creative and production teams to establish her as the villain for
24:14younger wrestling fans to boo. It isn't the bratty, devious Liv Morgan that began
24:19on the main roster seven years earlier. It was all there. You could see it in the
24:24Riott Squad and the mischief, but this is a colder, more calculated, truly
24:31veminous version of Miss Morgan, who has used her years of experience and a
24:38thirst for revenge to truly take her place at the top of the wrestling
24:44mountain. It'll be exciting to see what happens to her next. Who's the next heart
24:49to be broken on Liv Morgan's never-ending revenge tour? How do you
24:54feel about Liv Morgan? You've watched this whole video and you can't get into
24:58the comments? Come on, let's hear from you. Also, check out these great videos
25:01from Sportskeeda Wrestling.