Dakota Kai is feeling good enough to be back by the side of her Damage CTRL teammates, Bayley and IYO SKY. It just might be another few months before WWE fans see her as an active competitor again.
Kai gave the latest update on her recovery from a torn ACL suffered in May on her Twitch stream this week, where she noted the big difference between being able to walk around and resuming full-blown athletic activity when rehabbing from this particular injury (h/t Wrestling Observer).
Probably 2024, actually. I do think it’s funny that a lot of people are like, ‘She’s not injured at all, look at her walking around.’ But like, ACL injury — I haven’t even learned how to jump and run again yet. I think I’m going to start running this week. But ACL recovery, especially for someone that’s in sport or something like that where you use your legs a lot. Like, if I was a desk worker or something like that, I’d be back in work properly — like fully now. But because it’s wrestling, I won’t be cleared until January.
Kai has some unfortunate knowledge in this particular area, as she also suffered a torn ACL in late 2018 that required surgery in January 2019. In NXT at the time, she made her return to the ring in September 2019, a little more than nine months after she was hurt.
A January return this time around would actually be a little faster than that timetable, which would be great to see. In the meantime, Kai is likely to continue supporting her mates in Damage CTRL on WWE television, especially with SKY reigning as WWE Women’s Champion.
[lawrence-related id=35588]