Rumor Roundup (Dec. 1, 2022): Sasha Banks & Charlotte Flair returns, Kevin Owens’ status, more!

Speculating on the rumors surrounding pro wrestling is a favored pastime of many fans, perhaps second only to actually watching the matches. In this daily column, we take a look at the latest rumors being churned out by the pro wrestling rumor mill.

Important reminder: Rumors are just that — rumors. None of this has been confirmed as fact, it’s just circulating around the pro wrestling rumor mill. We track rumor accuracy in a weekly feature called Rumor Look Back you can find here. Remember, take it all with a grain of salt.

Rumors for the Day:

• Sasha Banks and Charlotte Flair both stirred up speculation they could be returning soon: Flair with a pic of her wrestling boots on her Instagram Story, and Banks with a TikTok of her training in Mexico City with the caption “She’s coming” and WWE, AEW & Joshi Puroresu hashtags.
• Kevin Owens is “still hurt”, per Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio, but Owens should be able to continue working through his knee injury.
• An internal WWE memo promoting the success of Survivor Series got into Fightful Select’s hands. It claimed the Nov. 26 PLE was the most viewed Survivor Series on record, with the best in-venue merch sales in event history, increased year-over-year social media video views, and a 48% improvement in “fan enjoyment rating” from 2021’s show.
• In his interview with Fightful, Dax Harwood said FTR thought their AEW contracts were up this year, but their current understanding is they expire in April of 2023. He also said the team is considering taking a year off from wrestling for major companies so they can take indie bookings that seem like fun to them.
• Andrade El Idolo tweeted that he tore his pec in his Aug. 17 trios match with RUSH & Dragon Lee against The Elite, which would mean he worked All Out’s Casino Ladder Match with the injury. Ric Flair commented on Andrade’s injury on his latest To Be The Man podcast: “I know it was a bad tear, so he’s going to be out awhile with it.”
• Dakota Kai told the Getting Over podcast that a couple years ago Bayley wanted her, Candice LeRae & Tegan Nox for a Damage CTRL-like stable. A pitch for an “updated version” that included Kai, IYO SKY, Kay Lee Ray (now Alba Fyre) & Raquel González (now Rodriguez) earlier this year got to the point group photos were taken and introductory videos filmed before plans changed.

If you have heard of any interesting rumors that you’d like to add, feel free to post them in the comments section below. Just remember they are rumors and not confirmed as fact, so please take them as such. And check our weekly Rumor Look Back here to keep track of how often rumors turn out to be correct.