Cathy Kelley sends a heartfelt message to Dakota Kai

WWE backstage interviewer Cathy Kelley has posted a heartfelt message for her real-life friend Dakota Kai. The former Damage CTRL member recently departed from the Stamford-based company.

King Kota was among the most popular stars let go by the wrestling promotion last week. It was the second instance of the global juggernaut releasing Kai from her contract. She previously left the company briefly in April 2022 before re-signing three months later and joining forces with Bayley and IYO SKY on her return at SummerSlam.

Cathy Kelley recently took to her X/Twitter account to wish Dakota Kai on her 37th birthday. She penned down a heartwarming message for the two-time WWE Women's Tag Team Champion and referred to the Kiwi as her best friend.

"Happy birthday to the most genuine, most caring, most talented @ImKingKota. I feel lucky to know you and even more lucky to call you my best friend 🥹 they say you are a product of the five people who spend the most time with—if I’ve become even a fraction of the human you are, I’ve done something right. Here’s to more soosh adventures and cryo hangs in random cities. cannot wait to see where this journey takes you!!" she wrote.

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You can check out the X/Twitter post below:

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Wrestling veteran slams WWE over Dakota Kai's release

Former WWE head writer Vince Russo recently lashed out at WWE, questioning the company's booking of female talent.

On a recent episode of Sportskeeda Wrestling's BroDown, Russo stated that WWE releasing Kai after bringing her back implies the wrestling promotion has no idea what they're doing. He added that the company had booked female wrestlers terribly.

"I find it unusual because it's the second time. Even though this was Dakota Kai's second time, which tells you how messed up they are. If you're letting somebody go, bringing them back, and then letting them go a second time, that kind of reeks of you don't know what you're doing. I do a show every Friday called Thursday thrashing Friday, and I talked about WWE go through women wrestlers like breath mints. I even said on that show, I said Dakota Kai was gonna get released this morning. And I had no inside information. But Mac, I don't know what it is with the way WWE just goes through women's talent without getting anybody over," he said. [From 1:38 onwards]

You can check out Vince Russo's comments in the video below:

It remains to be seen what's next for Dakota Kai and all other stars released from WWE last week.

About the author

Ankit Verma is a WWE news writer with over four years of experience in the writing field. He graduated with a Master’s degree in Physical Sciences, but his love and passion for writing and pro wrestling led him to create content about it.

He writes his articles putting himself in the readers’ shoes, making sure it’s as simply written, informative, and straight to the point as possible while being devoid of opinion. Ankit strives to present accurate information by ensuring the source is credible and cross-checking all facts and figures.

Ankit would have liked to have managed Kane during The Attitude Era, helping to take the Big Red Monster to greater heights than his brother/rival, The Undertaker. His favorite pro wrestler of all time is AJ Styles.

When Ankit is not writing for Sportskeeda, he enjoys spending his time studying astronomy and playing cricket.

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Edited by Brandon Nell