AEW's Leva Bates Shares Insight On Why Her WWE Run Didn't Work Out

Leva Bates might be working a behind-the-scenes role in AEW, but she is still well-remembered for her run in WWE "NXT" as the persona Blue Pants. But despite working for over a year with WWE, Bates revealed she "was never fully signed."

The former Librarian recently appeared on Thunder Rosa's "Taco Vlog" and revealed that she felt like "a science experiment" due to the fact she was never signed, but her popularity inspired WWE to bring her back. Bates revealed that she did end up having a merchandise deal, with her biggest moment coming at NXT Takeover: Brooklyn in 2015, when she appeared as a surprise to be a valet for The Vaudevillains.

"I came in for a one-time, one thing only. They didn't expect it to be like it was, we got the 'Blue Pants' chant. Hunter came out and was like, 'You guys got a Blue Pants chant,' and just starts laughing, cackling, and walks away," she said. "So, legit, I was asked to come back the next taping, 'Hey, we want to see if this Blue Pants thing is our thing?' ... So I am waiting behind the wings ... They started chanting 'Blue Pants' and it was wild."

Bates admitted that after her injury, she was told, 'Oh, the jokes over now. It's too long," which is something she understood. Despite that, she revealed the company did bring her up to "WWE SmackDown" but they never utilized her.

"They were bringing me into SmackDown because the writer from NXT that was writing all the Blue Pants stuff got moved to SmackDown, so they brought me into SmackDown a couple of times, but I was never actually used. I was like, 'Oh, I was supposed to be in this spot,' and then a couple of hours before a taping, I would get removed."

Bates never did get the chance to perform on WWE "SmackDown" despite her popularity during the course of her WWE "NXT" run, but that was down to a situation out of her control.

"So finally, one day, I was told by someone, a friend of mine in the office, he's like, 'Hey, this isn't a reflection of you. I am not saying names but a producer and a writer are butting heads a lot and he's nixing all his ideas.' So I was just a byproduct of that, from what I was told."

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit Thunder Rosa's Taco Vlog with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.