Santana hasn't been seen in AEW in nearly a year, but he's still with the company.
The former LAX member had a private falling out with his longtime tag team partner Ortiz, and had already been teaming with him less when an unfortunate ACL injury took place in the Blood N Guts match. Prior to that, Santana had been publicly counting down what many assumed was the expiration of his AEW contract.
However, Fightful has inquired numerous times within AEW about Santana's status with the company. It was confirmed to us that Santana remains with All Elite Wrestling and has been paid through the duration of his injury.
We should reiterate, his contract expiration was never officially clarified to us. However, a source familiar with AEW deals said that if Santana's deal was up in September as he'd hinted on social media, that AEW could attempt to keep him in the company a couple of months past his injury return, as that was the amount of contracted time he would have had left when injured.
Those that we spoke to said that Tony Khan has been adamant that AEW will pay injured talent, even in this case, which could have been well after the contract could have expired. In all, AEW paid for over a half-year that Santana could have been off the books.
We haven’t heard any update on Santana and Ortiz mending fences, but Ortiz has been used on ROH of late.
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