In an interview with Developmentally Speaking (via Fightful), Dabba-Kato spoke about his release from WWE last year and said that he sensed it was coming at the time. Kato was part of the NXT brand and his last match was a loss to Tyler Bate on September 5, 2023.
He said: “I think I kind of sensed it. My contract was coming to an end anyway. We already had conversations long before it was close to that. Now, we came pretty close, I started pushing stuff and I could feel there was nothing great planned for me. You get that feeling and I had that feeling the day was going to come. I lived through so many cuts. It happened to so many guys before me. You can prepare yourself a little bit for it. You can prepare yourself financially and mentally, which I didn’t think would be as hard as it was.“