How Released WWE Star Is Keeping Their Ring Name

A former WWE star has explained how they were able to keep their ring name after being released from the company.

On April 28th at Rebellion, TNA announced the signing of former WWE star Indi Hartwell. Hartwell was released from WWE in November along with Baron Corbin and Tegan Nox. Surprisingly, the former NXT Women’s Champion has been able to keep the name she used in the company, something few stars can do.

During a recent appearance on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, Hartwell said there was a simple reason she could use the name: she asked.

“I just asked. This is how it went — so I’ve had this name my whole wrestling career. When I started at NXT, when you start wrestling on live events, they make you wrestle under your real name. So I wrestled under my real name for a bit. And then I think I had a dark match at NXT. And I just asked Road Dogg, like, ‘Can I be Indi Hartwell for this?’ And he’s like, ‘Oh, yeah, I’ll ask. Why not?’ And then they let me be Indi Hartwell for the dark match. And then it kind of just like kept going. And then I got on TV with it. I got my action figure with that name. I got in the game with that name.”

When NXT became NXT 2.0, the subject of her name came up again, and that led to her selling the rights to WWE. Despite this, she was able to work things out with the company after her release.

“And then I think it was when NXT 2.0 started, they went through that whole weird thing of like, you have to… you can’t have your real name and you also can’t have a name that we don’t own. So they gave me the option to change my name or sell it to them. So I sold it to them. And then it was always in the back of my mind like, oh my gosh, if I get released, like what name am I going to be? Like that’s a big deal to me. So then when I got the call that I was being released, they said, ‘Ok, yeah, we’re releasing you.’ I said, ‘Ok, cool, so I sold my name to the company. Is there any way I can get that back?’ And then we got it all figured out. I got the rights and stuff to it.”

Indi Hartwell Received Message Of Support From AJ Styles After WWE Release

AJ Styles sent Indi Hartwell a motivational message after her WWE release. The star says he encouraged the Australian star to “keep battling” and not give up. Hartwell has taken the message to heart, resuming her career on the independent scene before signing with TNA.

H/T to F4WOnline for the above transcription.