Trainer plays big part,
Women’s wrestler Bayley acknowledges that she “started to feel lost at certain times” last summer when she was champion of NXT, WWE’s third brand focused on development, and the women she had worked with for years had moved up to the main roster on Monday Night Raw and Smackdown Live.
But she knew exactly who to turn to — Sara Amato — the same person she had turned to for the previous four years as Bayley’s character grew into one of the most popular in the wrestling business, male or female.
“She was always there to help me through every match, to build my confidence and just point me in the right direction,” said Bayley, now the Raw women’s champion. “She has so much experience and knowledge. The women’s division has been very, very lucky to have her.”
Amato was hired as the first female coach in WWE history in 2012 and was recently named the company’s inaugural director of women’s wrestling. The role encompasses trainer, coach, mentor, producer and advocate.
Performers coached by Amato will be all over Sunday’s WrestleMania in Orlando, and her current pupils will be part of NXT Takeover: Orlando on Saturday.
“I’m a big fan of trying to empower the women to think for themselves,” she says. “They don’t have the same sensibilities that I would as a performer and as an athlete, and the competition’s different now, so I want them to find their way to tell a compelling story in the ring, to be a compelling performer …
“I really like exposing people to wrestling in a different way and seeing their passion for this develop. To me, that’s the highlight of what I do.”
As a performer, Amato, now 36, worked around the world on the independents as Sara Del Rey and was so proficient she was nicknamed “The Death Rey.” She was a star in promotions such as Shimmer and Chikara and elsewhere. In 2012, she became the fourth woman ever named to the annual PWI 500, a ranking of the
world’s top 500 pro wrestlers by Pro Wrestling Illustrated.
A discipline of ex-WWE world heavyweight champion Daniel Bryan when Bryan was the head instructor for All Pro Wrestling in California, Amato had been trained by men when she started but was trained by women when she worked in Japan and Mexico.
“I know training under a woman — because you’re wrestling with women — is something completely different than training under a man,” she says. “I’ve always very much liked being in the ring but not so much performing in front of people. I just thought ( being a coach) would be a very good fit for me and for my passion to fulfill my love of wrestling.”
Four-time WWE women’s champion Charlotte Flair, who was coached by Amato at NXT, puts it more succinctly: “They brought in a female coach, and look where we’ve taken things.”
“Men had always been teaching the girls,” Flair says. “The perception was men are better, they know more, they have more experience, so the guys should be training the girls.”
Amato’s hire was another step in a movement by WWE executives to change the perception of women’s wrestling by changing the type of performers they hired. That extended to their coach.
“Sara Amato was one of the most important hires in modern WWE history,” says Mike Johnson, who covers the industry for PWInsider.com. “She was an extremely talented pro wrestler who could step inside the ropes with the girls and help guide and direct them with a women’s perspective as well as the perspective of a veteran performer. She has a keen eye for making talent stand out and for mentally and physically prepping them.”