Summer Rae - Wrestlers, Family and Life

Summer Rae was born Danielle Louise Moinet, on November 28, 1983, in New York, to a French father and a British mother. She was the first child in her family to be born in the US. Soon after her birth, her family moved to North Carolina for better career opportunities.

Always interested in sports and fitness, she started hitting the gym early in her life and continued with it throughout her high-school years. She attended the ‘East Carolina University’ and became the first person from her family to ever go to college. After completing college, she joined a desk job with a small company. Very soon, she realized that she was not someone who could spend more than 50 hours every week in front of a computer, and she decided to quit her job.

Following her decision to quit her job, she randomly picked a city, which happened to be Chicago, and moved there. Initially, she faced difficulties due to lack of funds and the loneliness that stemmed from the fact that she did not know anyone there. Somehow, she started getting accustomed to it and attempted to try her luck in the modeling industry.

She was eventually selected to play football for the team ‘Chicago Bliss’ of the ‘LFL’ in 2008. She eventually became the captain of the team, and in June 2011, she played in the ‘LFL All-Star Game’ in Ontario, Canada. This was her last football tournament, after which she quit football.

She was an avid fan of wrestling since her childhood. After moving to Chicago, she would often get busy with football and would never miss any ‘WWE’ broadcast. She worked at the ‘Chicago Wizard World Expo’ and heard that a few ‘WWE’ superstars were to visit the event. She scored a meeting with the talent director and with the wrestling superstar Triple H. A month later, she received a call regarding an offer.

In November 2011, she announced that she had signed a contract with ‘WWE,’ and she was soon assigned to the ‘FCW.’ In December, she appeared for the first time in ‘FCW TV,’ with wrestler Abraham Washington. For the next few months, she worked as a ring announcer with ‘FCW.’ Soon, she was offered the position of the general manager of ‘FCW.’

By then, she had already started a subtle rivalry with a female wrestler, Paige, and it turned violent in January 2013, when she attacked Paige from behind. Defending her behavior, she said that Paige did not deserve to be as popular as she had become. They had an official fight on ‘NXT’ on May 1, which saw Paige easily defeating Rae.

Rae then attempted to win the ‘NXT Women’s Championship,’ and after defeating some strong contenders in the first few matches, she lost the semi-final match to Emma. Feeling bitter about the loss, she attacked Emma from behind after the match, and this started a brutal feud between the two female wrestlers.

Emma and Rae walked into a dance-off to determine the new contender for the championship, and Emma won. However, Rae injured Emma in the “storyline” and issued a challenge to Paige. On August 14 that year, Paige defeated Rae and successfully defended the title of the ‘NXT Women's Champion.’ Rae then formed a friendship with Sasha Banks and manipulated her to attempt to make herself relevant. The duo formed a team and faced Emma and Paige in the ring in October and managed to defeat them.

For the next few months, Rae disappeared from the wrestling scene. She returned in June next year, carrying on her villainous legacy. She started a tiff with Paige and Emma again, but this time around, she was alone, as her old friends Charlotte and Sasha Banks distanced themselves from her.

In April 2013, she made her ‘WWE’ main roster debut as the dance partner of Fandango on ‘Raw.’ Summer and Fandango faced a dance-off against the pair of Chris Jericho and professional dancer Edyta Sliwinska, which was cut short when Rae hurt her ankle. Following this, Fandango deceivingly attacked Jericho. Rae later confirmed that she had feigned an injury to give Fandango a chance to hit Jericho.

In October, she appeared on ‘Smackdown,’ picking up a fight against Natalya during a match between The Great Khali and Fandango. Following this, a mixed tag-team match was held at ‘Hell in a Cell,’ in which Rae and Fandango’s team emerged victorious.

In April 2014, she participated in a ‘14-Diva’ “Vickie Guerrero Invitational Match,” making her ‘Wrestlemania debut.’ AJ Lee, the defending champion, emerged the victor at the end of the match. In the same month, Fandango officially announced that Rae was no longer his dancing partner. This was a staged move to give Rae enough time to finish the filming of her debut film ‘The Marine 4: Moving Target.’

In June 2014, miffed at Fandango for firing her as his dance partner, she attacked him during a match that had him as a referee. The following few years saw her getting involved in a number of controversies, such as a feud with The Miz and her relationship with Rusev. She proposed to Rusev on live TV and was rejected. Following that, she appeared as the manager of a new wrestler, Tyler Breeze, and called him her “new man.”

She then made many in-ring appearances and lost most of her matches. After sometime, she stopped being relevant. She was released from her contract in October 2017.

She has appeared in five official ‘WWE’ video games since 2014.

Summer Rae has clarified that her appearance on ‘WWE’ is just a character she plays and that she is a very different person in real life. The show features her as a mean and nasty woman.

She volunteers for her family’s charity, ‘The Dean Thomas Moinet Foundation,’ in her free time. It is a charitable organization that works toward medically fragile children in North Carolina.

She has been in relationships with fellow wrestlers Rusev and Tyler Breeze. She was engaged to Rusev but ended her relationship with him eventually.