Josh Barnett Weighs In On This WWE Star's Transition From MMA To Pro Wrestling

Former UFC star Josh Barnett has remembered training Shayna Baszler to become a pro wrestler and what he tried to teach her to make her be believable in a pro wrestling ring.

Barnett, in a recent appearance on "Stories with Brisco and Bradshaw," recalled training Shayna Baszler early in her pro wrestling career, and how indie promoters wanted to promote her a certain way, tapping her MMA background. 

"But when she gets into the market, she starts having these promoters tell her to wear MMA gloves to the ring and do all this stuff," recalled Barnett. "And I'm like, 'Well, okay but everybody already knows you're a shooter. You don't have to wear gloves and you don't have to do this. You don't have to. They already know that if you're wearing those gloves and you're not punching people in the face and knocking them out, which, if you're going to do that on out there, takes a lot more effort to learn how to do that it's a little trickier and let alone,  I don't know if these girls are going to want you socking them in the face."

Barnett believes that wrestlers like Baszler who have been in the MMA ring, don't need to do a lot to make the audience believe their toughness.

"But if you're hitting them and they ain't going down well, it just makes you look bad, and you don't have to. You don't have to try and get people to believe what you do, you grab that girl's wrist that it has way more impact when you do it than when a lot of these other girls do," said the former UFC star.

He recalled how he trained Baszler, helping her combine her traits from the MMA ring with traditional pro wrestling moves. After the end of her MMA career, Baszler wrestled in Stardom and other pro wrestling promotions before being signed by WWE in 2017. She first featured in "WWE NXT," before making the switch to the main roster.