WWE Champion Suffers Painful Injury on Live TV

A WWE champion appeared to have suffered a serious injury on Tuesday night. During the main event of the WWE NXT Spring Breakin special episode, NXT Women’s Champion Indi Hartwell suffered a lower leg/ankle injury on a dive to the outside by Tiffany Stratton. Hartwell’s leg was bent under her when Stratton landed on her. She began to untie her boots and medical personnel rushed to ringside to tend to her, according to Cageside Seats. 

Hartwell was taken to the back as Stratton and Roxane Perez, the other competitor in the triple threat match, battle in the ring. It was not clear what was going to happen in the match if Hartwell didn’t return, but the NXT Women’s Champion came back to pin Perez to retain her title. However, Hartwell was noticeably injured as she was hobbling around in the ring. 

View on X

Fellow NXT Superstar Dijak went to Twitter to say that the injury to Harwell is legit as he was sitting next to her while she was being evaluated by medical personnel. Dijak also praised Hartwell for battling back and getting the win. It’s now known how serious the injury is or if she will miss any action. 

Hartwell has been with WWE since 2019 after competing in her home country in Australia. She has been with NXT during her entire run with WWE and won the NXT Women’s Championship earlier this month after winning a six-way ladder match at Stand & Deliver. In May 2021, Hartwell and Candice LeRae won the NXT Women’s Tag Team Championship and became the third team to win the title. 

After winning the NXT Women’s Championship, Hartwell spoke to Alex McCarthy of The Daily Mail about winning the title. “I’ve honestly never experienced anything like it, I didn’t think I’d get emotional, but I did, I had a long journey to get here,” Hartwell said, per WrestlingNews.net. “I’ve been in NXT coming up four years this year and I was wrestling through the pandemic with no fans, so to have that moment in front of them was very special. The past year has not been the best for Indi Wrestling, me being Indi Wrestling, so I know I had a lot of people behind me, I know when I go out there for NXT every week, and our live events and stuff, I have everyone behind me, I see the online support I get, I felt it, I did.”