Saki Akai officially retires from in-ring action, receives offer to be DDT staff member

Akai officially wraps up her in-ring career. 

At DDT Pro-Wrestling’s Ultimate Party event, Saki Akai officially wrapped up her in-ring career. Dating back to May, Akai has been on her retirement tour and that concluded with a six-person tag that featured herself and fellow members of Eruption, Yukio Sakaguchi and Hideki Okatani taking on Naomichi Marufuji, Miyu Yamashita and Kazusada Higuchi.

In the final sequence of the match, Sakaguchi, Okatani, Marufuji and Higuchi left the ring to Yamashita and Akai. Yamashita gave Akai one final shot before pinning her for a three count. All participants in the match went on to embrace Akai. 

She was later honored via a video package and bouquets of flowers were brought out for her by Okatani, Sakaguchi, Rina Yamashita and finally, DDT President Sanshiro Takagi. Takagi, who brought Akai into DDT, offered her a position as a staff member for the organization which was accepted. 

Video messages from the likes of Hiroshi Tanahashi and Togi Makabe aired. There was a video message from WWE’s Shinsuke Nakamura but the audio and video were not included in the livestream on DDT Universe. 

Akai is wrapping up a 10-year run with DDT. Alongside Sakaguchi and Okatani, she relinquished the KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Championships. 

About Andrew Thompson 8290 Articles
A Washington D.C. native and graduate of Norfolk State University, Andrew Thompson has been covering wrestling since 2017.