Zelina Vega


Thea Megan Trinidad is an American professional wrestler, manager, and actress. She is currently signed to WWE, where she performs on the Raw brand under the ring name Zelina Vega.
Trinidad previously worked in Total Nonstop Action Wrestling as Rosita, and for various independent promotions under her real name. In TNA, she was a one-time Knockouts Tag Team Champion with Sarita.

Early life

Thea Megan Trinidad was born in the Queens borough of New York City on December 27, 1990. She is of Puerto Rican descent. She grew up watching professional wrestling with her father Michael and younger brother Timothy, and was inspired by Rey Mysterio. Her parents divorced when she and her brother were still young, though they remained friends. Trinidad practiced swimming and baseball at school. When she was 10 years old, her father was killed in the September 11 attacks; he had worked as a telecom analyst for Cantor Fitzgerald at the World Trade Center, and was on the 103rd floor of the North Tower when it collapsed.
Trinidad's mother, Monique Ferrer, approached StoryCorps with the story of how she and her husband had met and what she experienced on the day of the attacks with his death, which StoryCorps used to create a short cartoon titled Always a Family as a way of honoring his memory. Trinidad has said it was because of her father that made her enter the wrestling business. She was featured in an NBC special, titled Children of 9/11, on September 5, 2011. Growing up, she also worked as a counselor on a camp for children that had lost parents on 9/11 and also participated in charitable causes such as Habitat for Humanity with Tuesday's Children after Hurricane Katrina.

Professional wrestling career

Early career

At the age of 17, Trinidad began training under Javi-Air, Azrieal, and T.J. Perkins. Trinidad made her professional wrestling debut under the ring name Divina Fly for National Wrestling Superstars on February 20, 2010, in Bloomfield, New Jersey, where she competed against Brittney Savage in a losing effort. On the August 21 NWS event, Fly competed against Niya in a losing effort. On October 1 at an NWS event, Trinidad, now under the ring name Snookie Fly, teamed up with Judas Young and Mike Dennis in a losing effort to Brittney Savage and Team Supreme in a mixed-tag-team match.
On February 20, 2010, she made her debut for Women Superstars Uncensored, under the ring name Divina Fly in a losing effort against Brittney Savage. On June 26, 2010, Divina Fly and Niya, collectively known as The Fly Girls, competed for the WSU Tag Team Championships but lost to the reigning champions, Cindy Rogers and Jana. On September 11, 2010, Divina Fly won a match against newcomer Candy Cartwright with a Fly Cutter.

Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (2011–2013)

After being discovered by Tommy Dreamer, Trinidad wrestled in a tryout dark match at Total Nonstop Action Wrestling's Impact! television tapings on January 11, 2011, losing to Angelina Love. On January 27 it was reported that Trinidad had signed a contract with the promotion. On the February 10 episode of Impact!, Trinidad, under the ring name Rosita debuted as the storyline cousin of Sarita in an eight knockout tag team match, where the two of them teamed with Madison Rayne and Tara and defeated Angelina Love, Mickie James, Velvet Sky and Winter, when Rosita pinned Sky. The following week Rosita and Sarita defeated Angelina Love and Velvet Sky in a tag team match to earn a shot at Love's and Winter's TNA Knockouts Tag Team Championship. On March 13 at Victory Road, Rosita and Sarita defeated Love and Winter to win the TNA Knockouts Tag Team Championship, with Sarita proclaiming that their victory would start a Mexican takeover of TNA. On the following episode of Impact!, the alliance of Rosita, Sarita and Hernandez was named Mexican America. The three of them were then defeated in a six-person street fight by Love, Winter and Matt Morgan. On March 24, the three were joined by Anarquia. In the following weeks Rosita and Sarita successfully defended the Knockouts Tag Team Championship first against The Beautiful People and then against Madison Rayne and Tara. They made their third successful defense on the June 16 episode of Impact Wrestling, defeating Velvet Sky and Ms. Tessmacher, following outside interference from ODB. Rosita and Sarita lost the TNA Knockouts Tag Team Championship to Ms. Tessmacher and Tara on July 12 at the tapings of the July 21 episode of Impact Wrestling. They received a rematch on August 7 at Hardcore Justice, but were defeated by Tessmacher and Tara. On the March 22, 2012, episode of Impact Wrestling, Rosita and Sarita again failed to recapture the Knockouts Tag Team Championship, when they were defeated by Eric Young and ODB.
On April 19 episode of TNA Impact, Rosita and Sarita teamed up with Madison Rayne and Gail Kim in a losing effort to Brooke Tessmacher, Tara, Velvet Sky and Mickie James. Rosita and Sarita were given another title opportunity on April 15 at Lockdown, but were once again defeated by Eric Young and ODB, this time in a steel cage match. Afterwards, both Rosita and Sarita went inactive from TNA, while Anarquia left the promotion and Hernandez turned face, effectively ending Mexican America. After months of inactivity, it was reported on January 9, 2013, that Trinidad's contract with TNA had expired and she had parted ways with the promotion.

Independent circuit (2011–2017)

In late August 2011, Rosita traveled to Mexico to attend an event held by the Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre promotion, for which Sarita regularly works under the ring name Dark Angel. During Rosita's stay in Mexico, she was trained by CMLL trainers, Arturo Beristain and Tony Salazar, and was eventually offered a contract with the promotion, which she, however, could not sign due to TNA's working relationship with rival promotion AAA. Just days later, Rosita appeared on AAA's television program, Sin Límite, promoting a storyline, where wrestlers from TNA were invading the promotion.
On May 14, 2011, Rosita made her in-ring debut for Family Wrestling Entertainment at the Meltdown pay-per-view, losing to fellow knockout Winter with Christy Hemme as the special guest referee. Rosita and Winter had three rematches, first on August 20 at Empire City Showdown, the second on November 15 at Fallout and the third on December 17 at Haastility; all were won by Winter. Rosita made her return to the promotion on March 24, 2012, at the Welcome to the Rumble pay-per-view, where she unsuccessfully challenged Maria Kanellis for FWE Women's Championship in a three-way match, after Winter pinned her to become the new champion.
On May 6, 2015, Global Force Wrestling announced Trinidad as part of their roster. She debuted for the promotion on June 12, 2015, where she defeated Lei'D Tapa at the first show of the GFW Grand Slam Tour in Jackson, Tennessee. On August 20, 2015, her profile was removed from GFW website.
On July 17, 2015, Trinidad made her debut in Ring of Honor, managing Austin Aries.
On September 2, 2016, Thea joined Shine Wrestling, debuting on Shine 37, which she ended up defeating Stormie Lee.

WWE

Early appearances (2013–2016)

On March 4, 2013, Trinidad took part in a tryout for WWE. She made several brief appearances in the promotion in 2014, including as one of Adam Rose's "rosebuds", and lost a match against NXT Women's Champion Asuka on the October 26, 2016 episode of NXT.

NXT (2017–2018)

By June 2017, Trinidad had signed a contract with WWE and began training at the WWE Performance Center. She started appearing on NXT with the June 9 episode, where she confronted Andrade "Cien" Almas about his behavior and slapped him. On the July 19 episode of NXT, she accompanied Almas as he attacked Cezar Bononi and retreated from No Way Jose. Under the name Zelina Vega, she was established as the heel manager of Almas, who defeated No Way Jose on August 9 episode of NXT. At on November 18, Vega accompanied Almas to a match against Drew McIntyre for the NXT Championship, where she interfered by attempting to perform a hurricanrana on McIntyre, failing on the first attempt, but managed to perform a hurricanrana driver on him later in the match before Almas captured the title. On January 27, 2018, at, during Almas' title defense against Johnny Gargano, Vega interfered and performed a diving hurricanrana on Gargano, resulting in her being attacked by Gargano's wife, Candice LeRae, while Almas eventually won the match. On January 28 at Royal Rumble, Vega made her first main roster appearance as she accompanied Almas in his entrance as number 7 during the Royal Rumble match. As part of the company, Vega made her in-ring debut for NXT during a live event on February 3, where she teamed with Almas to be defeated by Johnny Gargano and Candice LeRae. On the April 18 episode of NXT, Vega was accompanied by Almas during her first televised match in which she was defeated by Candice LeRae and this turned out to be Vega's and Almas' last appearances in NXT.

Main roster and managing roles (2018–present)

On April 17 during the Superstar Shake-up, Vega and Almas were both drafted to SmackDown. Vega made her debut for the brand on the May 15 episode, accompanying Almas in a match against a local wrestler in which he was victorious. On the July 31 episode of SmackDown, Vega had her first match on the brand, defeating Lana. She teamed with Almas and defeated Lana and Rusev at SummerSlam. At Evolution on October 28, Vega competed in a battle royal for a future women's championship match, but she was eliminated by the eventual winner Nia Jax. On January 15, 2019, Almas' ring name was shortened to Andrade. At WrestleMania 35, she participated in the Women's Battle Royal, but failed to win.
During the 2019 WWE Superstar Shake-up, both Zelina and Andrade were drafted to Raw. On April 22 however, Zelina was moved back to SmackDown. On the July 8 episode of Raw, Vega teamed up with Almas in a losing effort against Seth Rollins and Becky Lynch. As part of the 2019 draft, Vega and Andrade were drafted to Raw. Vega assisted Andrade most of the times and helped him retain the United States Championship on various occasions. Vega participated in the women's Royal Rumble match at the namesake pay-per-view and entered at #25 but was eliminated by Shayna Baszler.

Other media

Trinidad appeared in the 2012 film Dorothy and the Witches of Oz. She appeared in the documentary Children of 9/11, and on the first anniversary of the September 11 Memorial Ceremony, she participated in the reading of victim names. She portrayed wrestler AJ Lee in the 2019 film Fighting with My Family. She has said that Dwayne Johnson inspired her to act in films.
Trinidad appears as a manager in WWE 2K19 and playable character in WWE 2K20.

Personal life

Trinidad married fellow professional wrestler Tom Budgen, better known as Aleister Black, in 2018. She resides in Tampa, Florida.
On the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Trinidad spoke about her father who died as a result of the terrorist attack in an out-of-character interview on TNA's No Surrender pay-per-view.

Championships and accomplishments