Paige recently left the company where she worked for over a decade. Paige was not able to wrestle for all 10 of those years, however — since July 2016, Paige has only competed in seven matches, with her last coming in December 2017, after which she was forced into retirement due to a neck injury. However, in recent years we’ve seen previously retired stars like Edge and Bryan Danielson return to in-ring action, and the question of whether Paige would ever be able to return to wrestling has been on the minds of her fans for a long time. Paige, it seems, has been thinking about it as well.
“My neck is fantastic, I’m having so issues with it, and it’s looking good,” Paige said during an appearance on “The Bellas Podcast.” “I still want more time though. I mean, I’ve had nearly five years completely out of the ring, which is, it goes by so quickly. I’m like, ‘How?’ But yeah, I can see myself in the ring one day, but it would have to be something really special and like for like a big moment, even like, for WrestleMania.”
Paige last wrestled at a live event on December 27th, 2017 as part of WWE’s Live Holiday Tour, teaming with fellow Absolution members Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville to take on Bayley, Mickie James, and Sasha Banks. Unfortunately, the match would not go according to schedule, as it was ruled a no contest when Paige was injured after taking a move from Banks.
On the “WWE Raw” after WrestleMania 34 in 2018, Paige announced that she was retiring from professional wrestling; however, this would not be the last time fans would see her on screen, as she later worked in different roles for the company. Some of those roles included correspondent for WWE’s “Backstage” show that took place on FS1, manager for Kairi Sane and Asuka, a tag team known as the Kabuki Warriors, and General Manager of “WWE SmackDown.”
Paige’s contract with WWE expired in early July, allowing her to explore any ventures that she sees fit. Earlier in the interview, Paige revealed what her future plans are following her career with WWE.
“If I’m being honest, I don’t really want to do too much wrestling stuff out of the gate,” Paige said. “I kind of just want to start branching out more to like, different opportunities, you know, and I am excited for it. I am going to be doing some signings, of course, because I’m never going to forget my wrestling fans.”
“I do want to take on a whole new world which I didn’t get to opportunity to do in WWE,” she continued. “It’s the only thing that would really frustrate me with them is having all this time off and then being like, ‘Well, can I go do this?’ and then getting a ‘No,’ it’s like, ‘Well, I’m just sitting here, I’d really like to be doing something.’”
Paige found a great deal success in WWE, as she is one of the youngest champions in WWE history, becoming the first-ever “NXT” Women’s Championship in 2013 at the age of 20. She also won the Divas Championship on two separate occasions, and is technically undefeated at WrestleMania at 1-0 (2-0 if you count the pre-show).
