Kairi Sane Returns At WWE Crown Jewel 2023

The Pirate Princess makes her presence felt during WWE Women's Championship match.

WWE Crown Jewel 2023 Kairi Sane IYO SKY
WWE.com

After rumors flew in both directions about her status with the company, Kairi Sane didn't waste much time in making her onscreen return to WWE on Saturday at Crown Jewel.

The former NXT Women's Champion and WWE Women's Tag Team Champion arrived during the WWE Women's Championship match between Iyo Sky and Bianca Belair, attacking the EST and softening her up for Sky to finish her off with a moonsault. Afterward, Iyo and Kairi embraced and pummeled Belair, with the Pirate Princess hitting an InSane Elbow to punctuate the moment.

Fightful Select reports that Sane's deal was completed "months ago", as were the likes of Nia Jax and Lexis King after WWE's unofficial hiring freeze thawed. The site confirmed a Reddit rumor that there have been discussions of other wrestlers joining Kairi and Iyo, so it seems that Damage CTRL could experience some upheaval in the near future.

Kairi and Iyo have been in a stable together before, forming the group Threedom with Mayu Iwatani in Stardom in 2016. The two also teamed together in NXT in 2018-19 before Sane was called up to the main roster.

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Sane was last seen in WWE in July 2020, when she was written out of the company via a Bayley attack. In reality, her contract had expired and she was returning home to Japan.

During the past three years, Kairi wrestled for Stardom and New Japan Pro Wrestling, becoming the latter promotion's inaugural IWGP Women's Champion.

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Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.