Kassius Ohno reportedly released or furloughed as part of WWE cuts

A name that had been speculated on since Wednesday has been confirmed, at least according to Wrestling Observer’s Dave Meltzer. Meltzer reports Kassius Ohno was either released or furloughed by WWE this week.

Ohno (aka Chris Hero, real name Chris Spradlin) was on his second stint with WWE. Released in 2013 after a little less than two years in developmental, the indie veteran returned in January of 2017. During this latest run, Ohno was more of a “player/coach”. In NXT, he worked with recently signed and debuting talents, putting them over after a few matches. Recently he’d been featured on NXT UK in a similar role. In between television programs, Ohno was working with wrestlers behind the scenes.

Outside of his time in WWE, Ohno has more than two decades of experience in the business. He’s wrestled for just about every company, but is probably most well known for his work in Ring of Honor & Chikara, often with Cesaro (then going by his real name, Claudio Castagnoli) and Sarah Amato (fka Sara Del Rey).

While Ohno hasn’t confirmed the news himself, fans noticed mid-week he’d been moved to the “WWE Alumni” section of WWE.com. He’s also changed his own Twitter handle to “WWE Alumni”, and the header directs to his Pro Wrestling Tees store.

Because of his somewhat dual role, it’s not clear if he was furloughed with the hope of bringing him back or released outright.

Either way, best of luck to the Wrestling Genius.

You can find a complete list of those impacted by this week’s WWE budget cuts here.