Gabby Forza joins TNA Wrestling and wants to take on the men

Gabby Forza officially signed with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) last week, becoming the latest woman to join the company’s Knockouts Division.

Forza said in an interview with OutKick she wanted to sign with TNA because it’s one of the few major promotions that allow intergender wrestling (woman vs. man). She said being able to go up against men is one of the things she prides her pro wrestling abilities on.

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"For me, I wanted to join TNA really badly because I just felt like I could see myself there in general, but I was so excited to join TNA because there are so many women there that I want to work with so badly and I love that they do have intergender wrestling there as an option because from the moment I joined wrestling, I always wanted to wrestle men," she said. "That is kind of what I've made my schtick based off of, where I'm fighting men a lot on the independent wrestling scene. It's like I would say like one of my greatest strengths.

"So, if I ever get to do that at TNA, it would be like a dream for me. But mostly joining the women's division and becoming a TNA knockout was like my dream. So, I'm super excited."

When OutKick asked the first man she wanted to square off with, Forza named Ricky Sosa.

Those who haven’t seen Forza perform on the independent scene are in for a treat.

She is a former women’s tackle football player and was a powerlifter for a period of time. Though Forza is a kind person outside the ring, she’s trained her hardest to put down anyone who steps to her.

"Well, my wrestling persona is very much who I am," she said. "So, just a very bubbly person, very positive. But I also can fight pretty much anyone of any size. I have a very big strength background in powerlifting, and I played tackle football for most of my life as a linebacker. So being a woman that is built like a linebacker is, I think, for most of our lifetime has been an insult to women.

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"But for me, it's like the biggest compliment because that was my goal — to train to be one of the best linebackers in the world. And the fact I get to bring that into wrestling means I hit people really, really hard and it's very fun to do that and get to continue being an absolute menace in professional wrestling. But in the best way possible like I have an absolute blast doing it and I try to use my power for good, not evil, you know."

How does one even go from football to pro wrestling? It’s mostly seen on the men’s side. TNA stars like A.J Francis and Moose have done it successfully. Even WWE star Roman Reigns was playing college and pro football before he turned into the massive star he is today.

Forza told OutKick she started cheerleading at a young age before convincing her mother to let her play tackle football. She said she played the sport for more than a dozen a years, getting herself comfortable being able to hit and take hits from the men.

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"I'm very grateful to them because it shaped the rest of my life. I was always the smallest on my football team, but I played for 15 years — five of those years being on boys' teams being the only girl," she said. "But I was always used to going up against guys who were bigger than me but that made me a very strong person physically. My brother was always the biggest person on the football team and I was always the smallest. All the other guys growing up would take it easy on me because ‘that's a girl, don't hit the girl. My brother did not care. He was like, ‘Oh, I can hit my sister, let's go.’ So, I do credit my brother for making me very, very tough because he was literally the biggest and strongest, couldn't be taken down by anyone, but then there was me and I was like, ‘I’m getting him.’ Chasing my brother and literally beating each other up our entire childhood on various football teams made me not scared of anyone of any size and that I got the biggest fight in me. I’ve proven that all over the place. I took that into my women’s football career.

"I was a women’s tackle football player from 18 years old until I joined wrestling a few years ago. I became a seven-time All-American linebacker. I traveled across the states, I traveled across the world, to play against the best. I tried out for Team USA twice, I made alternate roster one time. I really wanted to go into my wrestling career as an Olympic gold medalist in my sport because I thought it would be really cool but unfortunately I only made the alternate roster. But I was a two-time national champion linebacker for my football team and I had all the accolades I think I could have achieved in football – really hit the ceiling in what I could achieve and then I brought all of that into wrestling without taking any time off. I’m like the hottest I’ve ever been, the strongest I’ve ever been and I’m excited to show the world that."

Forza hopes to be a source of inspiration for young women don’t necessarily fit the mold of what society says a woman should look like.

"I definitely aspire to inspire other people, especially young women who don't fit the typical shape of a woman, you fit the mold that society has built for us," she said. "That has made me want to be a TNA Knockout really badly because I’ve watched TNA and I've seen the type of women who thrive in TNA and I’m like I can absolutely be, not a wrestler in TNA but I feel like I can be a star at TNA and that’s kind of what I’m hoping to achieve and I think wrestling has been very good to me in the sense that I've been able to reach all these young people and young girls who come up to me all the time and tell me that I inspire them to work out, to get stronger, and not focus on being what other people expect them to be."

It’s unclear when Forza will make her debut. TNA holds "Impact" each Thursday night at 9 p.m. ET on AMC. The company will run its Lockdown pay-per-view on Sunday where each match is held inside a steel cage.