The Secret WWE History Of Liv Morgan

Gionna Daddio signed for WWE in late 2014 after being spotted working out at Joe DeFranco's gym. DeFranco had tangential links to wrestling as Triple H's personal trainer, drawing acclaim for the "Midnight Workouts" Hunter and wife Stephanie McMahon would share on their social media accounts. But any suggestion that Morgan's own hiring was fortuitous and/or nepotistic would be deeply unfair. The gym may have been where she went to work on her body, but wrestling had always been on her mind.

An Instagram post from earlier that year finds Morgan ringside (and marking the f*ck out) for the likes of John Cena and Evolution at Extreme Rules. And long before she was paid to do it for a living, she was grinding as if she was. As she put it in a WWE.com interview lost to the sprawling archives:

"[WWE] completely took over our lives. I fell in love with it the first moment I watched. We dug four poles into the ground and put lawn chairs in front of them for buckles. We tied three pieces of industrial rope around the corners, and the only mat we had was a stacked-up pile of lawn chair cushions. When we finished, we thought it was the most awesome thing ever, and my house instantly became the after-school spot for all of my brothers’ friends. I would literally take Pedigrees and powerbombs like it was my job...I always pretended to be Lita. All the Divas were so glamorous and girly, and I was such a tomboy and didn't have nice clothes. When I saw Lita come out in baggy pants and sneakers, wrestling the boys, I thought she was the coolest thing ever. I related to her and thought she could be my friend.”

Backyarding is where many wrestling dreams start to take shape (despite WWE's blanket stance against the practice), but much of her journey was unconventional. The Performance Center replaced going longer in traditional education after a chance meeting in a chain restaurant dictated her next big step.

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