Sasha Banks stands as one of the cornerstone figures of the Women’s Evolution who is often dubbed as the most technical female wrestler of this generation. For some reason, WWE mostly underutilized her talent by putting her into a jobber’s role while building stars like Charlotte Flair or Alexa Bliss.
But her contribution to building a strong women’s division is undeniable. Plus, she also holds the record of delivering uncountable benchmark performances throughout her WWE career. This made Sasha Banks a five-time Raw Women’s Champion who is yet to reach her potential, according to many of the fans. Apart from her wrestling skills, she is also a certified rapper cum singer.
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Let’s have a look at the career accolades of one of the Golden Role Models in WWE,
Sasha Banks: Career, Championship History & Personal Life Details
– Mercedes Justine Kaestner-Varnado is the real name of Sasha Banks who was born on January 26, 1992, in Fairfield, California, and later moved to various places, including Minnesota due to treatment and schooling for her disabled brother.
– Her family later settled in Boston, Massachusetts, where she began her professional wrestling career and thus got the billing from here. She attended online schooling while growing up watching All Japan Women’s Pro-Wrestling (AJW). She has an African American and European descent.
– Sasha Banks began her training at Chaotic Wrestling (CW) that was located in Woburn, Massachusetts, in 2008. She made her in-ring debut, under the name of Mercedes KV. On December 2, 2011, Banks defeated Alexxis in an “I Quit” match to win the Chaotic Wrestling Women’s Championship for the first time.
– On August 17, 2012, the Chaotic Wrestling Women’s Championship was declared vacant as the then Kaestner-Varnado signed a contract with WWE, which ended her title reign at 259 days.
– Sasha Banks also attended New England Championship Wrestling (NECW) and National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) under the name of Miss Mercedes before joining WWE. She also won
IWE (Independent Wrestling Entertainment) Women’s Championship on one occasion.
– In June 2012, Varnado participated in a WWE tryout camp and an announcement regarding her signing was done on August 18. She was assigned to NXT, WWE’s developmental territory where she was first given the name of Sasha Banks.
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– She made her televised debut on NXT on December 12, losing to Paige. Banks’ first televised win on NXT came on the January 23, 2013 episode against Alicia Fox.
– Sasha Banks was stuck in NXT’s mid-card level throughout the year. On April 6, 2014, she made an appearance at WrestleMania XXX as a part of Triple H’s entrance.
– On February 11 of next year at NXT TakeOver: Rival event, Sasha Banks won the NXT Women’s Championship by pinning Charlotte in a fatal four-way match that also involved Becky Lynch and Bayley.
– At NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn on August 22, Sasha Banks dropped the NXT Women’s Championship to Bayley in a classic match and thus ending her reign at 192 days. The match received high praise from the critics and won Match of the Year at the NXT Year-End Awards. In the rematch, At NXT TakeOver: Respect on October 7, Banks was again defeated by Bayley in the first women’s 30-minute Iron Man match in WWE history, with a 2-3 score in what appeared to be her last match in NXT.
– Her match against Bayley at NXT TakeOver: Respect on October 7, 2015, was the first women’s match to ever headline an NXT TakeOver, the first Iron Woman match in WWE history, and the longest women’s division match in the WWE history having a length of 30 minutes. This match was voted by Pro Wrestling Illustrated (PWI) as the Match of the Year, with Banks also being voted as the Woman of the Year.
– Sasha Banks made her official main roster debut on the July 13, 2015, episode of Raw along with Charlotte and Becky Lynch from NXT, after Stephanie McMahon called for a “revolution” in the WWE Divas division. Banks aligned herself with Naomi and Tamina Snuka to form Team BAD. (Beautiful and Dangerous) She had a winning streak for a few months winning matches against the likes of Bella Twins, Alicia Fox, Becky Lynch, and Paige.
– WWE’s Legit Boss made her WrestleMania debut in 2016 via a triple threat match between Sasha Banks, Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair for the Divas Championship. On the show, the title was retired and the Women’s Championship was introduced which was won by Flair.
– Sasha Banks was drafted to the Raw brand as part of the 2016 WWE Draft on July 19, 2016 wh9 made her first appearance for the brand on July 25 to defeat Charlotte to win the WWE Women’s Championship for the first time. On August 21 at SummerSlam, Banks dropped the championship back to Charlotte, ending her reign at 27 days.
– Sasha Banks was granted a one-on-one rematch on the October 3 episode of Raw, where she defeated Charlotte Flair in the main event to capture her second Raw Women’s Championship for the second time. Unfortunately, she lost the belt again after a 27-day reign at the first-ever women’s Hell in a Cell match at the Hell in a Cell pay-per-view event on October 30. The match was later declared as the main event making it the first time women had received the last match of a pay-per-view card in WWE.
– On the November 28 episode of Raw, Sasha Banks defeated Charlotte in a Falls Count Anywhere match to win the Raw Women’s Championship for a record-tying third time with Flair. Just 20 days later, a 30–minute Iron man match between the two took place at Roadblock: End of the Line on December 18, where Banks lost to Flair 3–2 in sudden death overtime.
– On August 20, 2017, at SummerSlam, Sasha Banks defeated Alexa Bliss to become a record-tying four-time Raw Women’s Champion with Flair. But eight days later, she dropped the title back to Bliss on Raw.
– On January 28, 2018, at the Royal Rumble, she was the first entry in the first Women’s Royal Rumble match. In June of that year, she took part in a Women’s Money in the Bank ladder match, for the first time.
– On February 17, 2019, at the Elimination Chamber, Sasha Banks, and Bayley won the inaugural WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship by lastly eliminating the team of Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville in a six tag team Elimination Chamber match. They dropped the title at WrestleMania 35 on April 7 to The IIconics (Billie Kay and Peyton Royce) in a fatal four-way tag team match, ending their reign at 49 days.
– Throughout the following weeks, rumors suggested that she was looking to quit the company due to her longstanding frustrations with WWE. She and Bayley weren’t apparently informed of losing the WWE Women’s Tag Team Titles until the very last minute. They reportedly expected to have a much longer title reign.
– After a four-month hiatus, Sasha Banks returned on August 12, 2019, episode of Raw as a heel for the first time since 2016, by attacking Natalya and Becky Lynch with a steel chair.
– Banks and Lynch then competed in the second-ever women’s Hell in a Cell match, which took place on October 6 at the Hell in a Cell pay-per-view which Lynch won. Sasha was then drafted to SmackDown brand during the 2019 WWE Draft who started an alliance with Bayley on the show.
– Sasha Banks and Bayley were successful in reclaiming the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championships on the June 5 episode of SmackDown by defeating Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross, making them the second tag team to have ever held the titles twice.
– On July 27 episode of Raw, she challenged Asuka for the Raw Women’s Championship. Bayley was shown on the TitanTron attacking Asuka’s partner, Kairi Sane. Asuka then intentionally got counted out of the match as she ran down to save Sane. Thus Banks won the title for a record-breaking fifth time in her career.
– Apart from the championship wins, Sasha Banks won Feud of the Year (2016) vs. Charlotte Flair,
Match of the Year (2015) vs. Bayley at NXT TakeOver: Respect, Woman of the Year (2015), and ranked No. 2 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2016. She made her WWE video game debut in WWE 2K17 who also appeared in WWE 2K18, WWE 2K19, and WWE 2K20. She also appears in the mobile games WWE SuperCard and WWE Mayhem.
– Sasha Banks is the first cousin of rapper Snoop Dogg, who helped her develop an in-ring persona. Snoop performed, live during her WrestleMania 32 entrance. She is also a first cousin of music producer Daz Dillinger and singers Brandy Norwood and Ray J. She is a fan of K-pop music and Japanese anime Sailor Moon.
– Varnado is married to WWE costume designer and retired professional wrestler, Sarath Ton, also known as Kid Mikaze, on August 4, 2016. Eddie Guerrero is her favorite wrestler as we often see her doing Guerrero’s pendant Frogsplash. She was in attendance at Guerrero’s memorial episode of Raw on November 14, 2005, in Minneapolis. (Sources – Wikipedia)
