WWE News on Kairi Sane Leaving the Company, Expected to Return to Japan Soon
It appears as though Kairi Sane won’t be in WWE for that much longer. The Wrestling Observer Newsletter’s Dave Meltzer is reporting that Sane is going to be moving back to Japan to be with her husband. They were married in February of this year and WWE did a website post congratulating Sane on the wedding.
The report notes that Sane leaving WWE has been known for a while perhaps in May or even earlier than that. Sane was legitimately injured when Nia Jax threw her into the ring steps at Raw tapings that took place on May 26. Sane had a huge cut on her head, they stopped the match and then filmed a finish. When the match aired on June 1, Sane’s face wasn’t shown in a close-up, so the viewer at home wouldn’t know that she was cut open legit. That was the last time Sane has been on Raw. The company decided not to talk about the injury, which is why Sane has barely been mentioned since then. Sane also had a scary moment in a match with Nia Jax when Jax sent her back first into the turnbuckle and Sane was dazed after that.
Sane is cleared and is scheduled to appear on WWE TV soon. Meltzer noted that Sane is listed for the Raw tapings that are taking place today, so if she is in a match or segment then we’ll see that on July 6 or July 13 because they are taping two weeks of Raw today.
It was mentioned by Meltzer that there was a plan in place to do a career-ending injury angle with Sane when it was time for her to leave and that would set up Sane’s tag team partner Asuka facing that person at SummerSlam in a Raw Women’s Title match. However, that plan could have changed since it was likely an idea from when Paul Heyman was the Executive Director of Raw and now he’s been replaced by Bruce Prichard. It’s not known who would have been the woman to take out Sane with Meltzer noting that it could have been Charlotte Flair or Shayna Baszler (who was removed from television months ago), but Meltzer said it was not scheduled to be Nia Jax.
What we don’t know is when Sane’s last official WWE date is. It might be these tapings taking place today or perhaps another set of tapings in the future. After doing some research, I saw that Kane signed three year deal with WWE in March 2020, so the deal was likely expired already or they agreed to end it soon.
Sane is 31 years old. There were rumors that when she returns to Japan she might wrestle for one more year (perhaps for Stardom, where she worked before) and then retire. We don’t know if she wants to have kids with her husband, but that’s certainly a possibility for a woman that recently got married.
TJR Thoughts: I can’t say I am mad at Sane for wanting to move back to Japan because that’s where she’s from and if she wants to raise a family, there’s no reason to be in America anymore. I thought she was great in NXT and the Insane Elbow that she did as a finisher was amazing. She had some good moments on Raw with Asuka, but I think they miscast her a bit by making her a heel. One thing I can predict is Sane probably won’t miss having to wrestle Nia Jax.
Best of luck to Kairi Sane, her husband and their future together.