McKenzie Mitchell Signs Deal To Become TNA's New Ring Announcer, Enjoying "Homecoming" (Exclusive)

Mitchell started her career in TNA as an interviewer and host before jumping to WWE for several years.

McKenzie Mitchell has signed a contract with TNA to be its next ring announcer. / TNA Wrestling

It was barely a year ago McKenzie Mitchell was comfortably moving her way up the WWE broadcaster ranks, establishing herself as a welcomed presence on WWE NXT programming as a host and backstage correspondent.

But there's an old tongue-in-cheek adage among those worn and battle-tested through years of working in media: you can't say you've truly "made it" in the industry until you've been laid off at least once.

On Dec. 1, 2023, Mitchell officially "made it." WWE let her go as part of a round of corporate layoffs, shocking not just fans, but everyone in her orbit.

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"My release came at a very unexpected time," Mitchell told The Takedown on SI. "It was very, we didn't know it was happening. It was a surprise to everybody. My family, my friends, I think peers. But it helps you grow. It helps you learn and to kind of go, 'what's next?'"

It's the dilemma so many anxious millennials find themselves facing in 2025. A dream is ripped away on a whim, and beyond the obvious need for financial resource, you're suddenly without direction and a path.

So she poured energy into her own jewelry and clothing line in Nashville, "HEADLINE by MM." She started writing a book.

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But sometimes, those directionless paths can lead you back to where you began. Such as ringside at a TNA pay-per-view.

"There's so much to be said for the connectivity of talking to the audience and keeping them engaged, and then really bringing those big, loud moments for a championship match," Mitchell said. "Joe Hendry getting to win the TNA World Championship like that. My voice will live behind that forever."

Mitchell's boisterous proclamation will live in pro wrestling immortality, as she served as ring announcer for the TNA Genesis show in January where the internet sensation Hendry finally won the big one. Fans were excited to see her return to wrestling in an on-screen capacity, but they'll be thrilled to learn there's more to come. Mitchell confirmed to The Takedown on SI she has signed a contract with TNA that makes her the company's permanent new ring announcer moving forward, replacing the departed Jade Chung.

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"It's another skill, as I've mentioned, that I'm tapping into from backstage correspondent to now really just embracing this new role as a ring announcer. I'm so excited to get to try my hand with some things and again, make it my own," she said. "We all have these different sounds, these different perceptions of what these ring announcers should look like and should feel like. And so I'm really excited to be the full-time ring announcer for TNA and just make it my own, and grow within this role."

When you talk to Mitchell, you quickly recognize she is a student of her craft. She is a professional broadcaster through and through, from her conversational prose to her body language in even a casual interview setting. She graduated Ole Miss with a wealth of on-air knowledge nearly a decade ago, and quickly made the jump to international television with TNA as its backstage correspondent and segment host in 2016.

"I think quite a bit of how thankful I am that I started my career in TNA, to be able to build, to have those stepping stones, to be able to, you know, try things and kind of get my personality in TNA before I reached over to WWE," she said. "So I think it really just created that foundation that allowed me to grow my wings and to be able to soar in this world of professional wrestling."

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Mitchell leveraged her TNA experience into a strong run with WWE, where she quickly became one of NXT's most recognizable faces and voices even through its different iterations. As the company struggled to properly identify its developmental brand under different guards of leadership, Mitchell was a guaranteed constant for viewers at home.

But the world between the ropes is far different than that before the backdrop. Sure, she holds a microphone in her hands in both arenas. But ring announcing required her to unlock a skill set that she was not all that used to utilizing.

"It's such a different skill to tap into as a backstage interviewer, backstage correspondent," she said. "That's really been my bread and butter for eight years, nine years in professional wrestling. So it's a different tone. It's a different conversation, because as a backstage correspondent, you're conversational, you're developing that rapport with talent, with an audience, and connecting on a different level to people backstage of when you're on screen, you want to feel like everybody's friend. But then when you are a ring announcer, you're technically projecting your voice in a completely different way. And so, I've really honed in that skill lately.

"My vocal coach has said time and time again, being a ring announcer and being able to project, and a commentator, if you will, it's an athletic thing," she said. "You're having to kind of tap into that athletic skill, if you will, whenever you're announcing as well. Because you're pulling you're pulling from your stomach, your chest, your throat."

Even as she conducts this interview, Mitchell is keeping her voice in check by fighting off flu-like symptoms so she can head to TNA's upcoming TV tapings in Orlando at NXT's former home Full Sail Arena. She noted she tries to draw inspiration from several of her peers in the industry like Alicia Taylor, Christy Hemme, and Lillian Garcia. She also plans to utilize some of her experience doing NXT house show ring announcing to further build and tweak her style, and is eager to try on a new shoe at an exciting time for TNA.

That is, of course, a time that sees TNA collaborating with her former home, NXT. Mitchell's husband happens to be NXT broadcaster Vic Joseph, and the crossover between the two entities only further ties that unpredictable path back home to familiarity.

MORE: WWE And TNA Announce Multi-Year Partnership

"It's really just the perfect partnership, the perfect timing, very coincidental for me," the 31-year-old Mitchell said. "It's ironic because people, you know, it's just again, it's no secret that my husband works at WWE still as the NXT play-by-play. And so in a kind of weird way, we're working together again. And that's really special in itself to be able to connect with my husband in different ways."

It's the perfect marriage of one's past with one's future, a place where Mitchell feels at home.

"Wth this new partnership with WWE and TNA, the sky is the limit," she said. "I think that there's so much that's to unfold that we're really excited for that. And to see where Joe Hendry can take the TNA World Championship, and to see the Knockouts Division continue to grow, it's just so amazing, and for me, really special to be back in TNA for the second time. It's for sure a homecoming."

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