Love at First Match

In 2015, I was in a strange place regarding my interest in professional wrestling. I was starting to feel WWE fatigue after nine years watching almost religiously, and CMLL and AAA, the lucha libre promotions I grew up watching, weren’t as accessible as they used to. As I was discovering new forms of entertainment, like movies and TV shows, I turned my attention to YouTube, which I used for watching vintage WWE matches posted in low quality, but it was the matches that YouTube recommended that would change my life.

I was far from unfamiliar to puroresu, after all, Mexico and Japan have exchanged talent for decades now, but I never was able to follow any promotion. As I mentioned in previous articles, Mexican women wrestlers thrilled Japan in the 2000’s, but fans only watch clips of the action during CMLL or AAA shows, or read about it in magazines, and physical media wasn’t accessible in my country. So, when I saw a video titled “Kairi Hojo vs Konami – Stardom”, I clicked out of curiosity, and I instantly knew this Kairi girl was going to be a favorite of mine.

She was skilled and captivating as no other, unique to all wrestlers I had seen before then, and there were lots of matches to get to know her work. In the next months I watched every match of hers I found on YouTube against the likes of Io Shirai, Mayu Iwatani, Yoko Bito, and Hiromi Mimura. Her World of Stardom title match against Meiko Satomura at Stardom vs. Stardom 2015 is an all-timer in my books. She introduced me to Stardom and their amazing wrestlers, which led me to find other joshi promotions like TJPW and Ice Ribbon. I even consider her match with Black Lotus Triad against Pentagon Black in Lucha Underground one of the best intergender matches of all time. Kairi not only made me love wrestling again, I started to watch it differently ever since, wanting to know everything about her and Stardom. I learned to analyze it and see beyond just the moves, something I didn’t know I was missing. 

A Bigger Stage

When she signed with WWE in 2017, my hype was in an all-time high, as she had accomplished almost everything she could in Stardom, and seeing how well they were booking Asuka at the time, I had high hopes for Kairi, now going by “Kairi Sane”. I watched all of her matches in the Mae Young Classic tournament, even though I couldn’t afford the WWE Network, and I remember I literally jumped from my seat when she defeated Shayna Baszler in the finals to win the tournament. Even when she lost her first title match for the NXT Women’s Championship, she had a great 2018, entering both the Royal Rumble and the WrestleMania Women’s Battle Royal, but it was her feud with Shayna Baszler that cemented her as the most popular woman in NXT, winning the title at NXT Brooklyn, but losing it at Evolution two months later, in what I consider the best match of her WWE career; at least we had her carrying her title in a freaking treasure chest.

When she debuted on the main roster in 2019, I was skeptical again after seeing how they were booking Asuka at the time. Asuka herself served as Kairi’s tag team partner, forming The Kabuki Warriors, with Paige as their manager. However, as months went on things just didn’t clicked: Paige just didn’t show any chemistry with the joshi and the Warriors themselves seemed to only be together to justify the creation of the Women’s Tag Team titles that same year, the same belts that they won at the abysmal Hell in the Cell PPV, where they randomly turned heel, a decision I instantly rejected and something I stand by to this day: Kairi has a hard time playing a villain. Her 2019 ended with a concussion during her tag team title TLC match with Asuka vs Charlotte Flair & Becky Lynch, where I also realized Kairi just isn’t made for extreme matches.

In 2020, funny enough, her matches weren’t what I was expecting the most, but the possibility of her entering WrestleMania in a giant pirate ship, but I guess some things are just not meant to be, since the pandemic prevented the event taking place at Raymond James Stadium. Also, they lost the titles to Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross. By this point, the WWE product was unbearable to watch for me, but every time Kairi was featured, I tried to tune up, but it seemed they were trying to punish me for it, having Nia Jax working stiff against Kairi, while also making her look so incompetent against Bayley in a backstage segment (even when she defeated her in a singles match) which ended up being her final WWE TV appearance in three years, only working as an ambassador and trainer for the company until late 2021.

Back to Japan

Yes, I almost faded when Stardom announced she would be returning to the promotion in 2022. She had the opportunity to face off against a new batch of talented girls like Utami Hayashishita and Saya Kamitani, as well as wrestlers that improved during her time away like Starlight Kid and Natsupoi. As a part timer, she challenged Kamitani for her Wonder of Stardom title, ending in a time-limit draw, but she didn’t waste any time capturing gold when just a day later she was crowned the first-ever IWGP Women’s champion, defeating Mayu Iwatani in the finals of a tournament at the NJPW/Stardom Historic X-over PPV. Unfortunately, she would go on to have a less-than-stellar reign, having an underwhelming match against Tam Nakano at Wrestle Kingdom 17 and then losing it to Mercedes Moné at NJPW Battle in The Valley 2023. After a one-month long reign with the Artist titles with Natsupoi and Saori Anou, and a couple of appearances in other promotions, she had her last match in Japan at Stardom Nagoya Golden Fight on October 9.

Watching Kairi as a part-timer felt a little weird, but she actually accomplished lots of things in the process, and I was happy to see her portrayed as a big deal, as she should be.

And Back to the E

When it was reported that Kairi was resigned by WWE in August 2023, I was less than enthusiastic, especially when she returned at Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia, to literally zero reaction from the crowd, to help Iyo Sky to retain her title against Bianca Belair. Now being a part of Damage CTRL, Kairi seemed destined to get lost in the shuffle and become the weak link of the group. Although her team lost in a War Games match in late 2023, she and Asuka won the Women’s Tag Team titles in early 2024 but were a little overshadowed by the Iyo-Bayley feud leading to WrestleMania XL. After losing the titles at Backlash France, Kairi didn’t do much for the rest of 2024 and started 2025 with an arm injury.

Return from Injury and My Epiphany

Once she returned on May 2025, she unfortunately failed to qualify for the Money in the Bank Ladder match, this being the match where a miscommunication between her and Zoey Stark led to Stark suffering a knee injury. Kairi then proceeded to beat both Liv Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez (then tag team champions) in consecutive singles matches. However, during a rematch against Liv Morgan in June, Morgan suffered a dislocated shoulder, and I got worried, not only for Liv, but for Kairi’s morale, having the bad luck of being involved in two of her fellow wrestler’s injuries in the span of one month.

I haven’t fully recovered (nor I think that I will in the near future) from my WWE fatigue, and I’ve only followed what some wrestlers do on weekly shows and PPV, with Kairi being one of them, and I’m actually pleasantly surprised that she’s been having, not only a number of victories, but good matches, to the point of being than the ones in her previous run, which made me realize that Kairi Sane has been my comfort wrestler since she returned this year. I enjoy everything she does in whatever time she gets on screen. I know she doesn’t have anything to prove, maybe she wins the World Championship, maybe she doesn’t, but she seems to be in a good place and I’m more than fine with that.

Kaori Hōsako, Kairi Hojo, Kairi Sane, KAIRI is my favorite female wrestler of all time. She’s right there with Rey Mysterio as my top 1. I will celebrate every time she wins a championship, every time she wins a match and every time I see her wrestle. If she ever leaves WWE, I won’t tell her to return, I will follow her wherever she goes, just like I did the first time.

Thank you, Kairi; you made me fall back in love with wrestling.