WWE has been the biggest wrestling company around the world despite of strong competition from other wrestling promotions. Now, WWE had made a interesting move of discussing a deal that fans didn’t see it coming.
NJPW has been working with several promotions for long time and recently, they also worked with AEW and IMPACT Wrestling. But now entire professional wrestling landscape could be in for a another massive shake up and can see even more dream matches.
Dave Meltzer of Wrestling Observer Newsletter reported that Nick Khan has been in talks with NJPW for being the exclusive American partner with the promotion. But there is no updates about how far the talks came between WWE and NJPW, dating back to March and April.
“In what could end up being among the biggest wrestling stories of the year, or a non-story, depending on the end result, Nick Khan has been in talks with New Japan Pro Wrestling about WWE being the exclusive American partner with the promotion,” noted Meltzer.
“Right now, New Japan has been working with AEW (KENTA, Yuji Nagata, Rocky Romero, and Ren Narita plus Jon Moxley working New Japan Strong) and Impact (Juice Robinson, David Finlay, El Phantasmo, and Satoshi Kojima) and has had a relationship with CMLL and ROH, but things have slowed down with those companies since COVID. Obviously, there are a million questions regarding such a deal if it was to happen, and there are no indications where talks are at past they date back to late March or early April,” Meltzer added.
Dave Meltzer also reported that this potential deal could allow WWE talent to work with NJPW for few dates and Nick Khan has been credited for changing the company’s hostile attitude, now, could be seen as active member of evolution wrestling community.
It was also noted that WWE’s goal is to prevent NJPW working with other major promotions. WWE also attempting to sign the same talent as other promotions and most of the percentage of young talent they looking for are grew up watching NJPW. So, this possible alliance will give some leverage in attracting new signings.
“Obviously, it’s also to keep New Japan, which pre-pandemic was the third strongest company in the world, away from working with other companies, which could strengthen the opposition and also be a factor with WWE gunning for the same talent as other companies because there is a percentage of younger talent that grew up on watching New Japan either via tape or YouTube where working there is a much bigger part of their career goals than the prior generation, and AEW talent has been willing to allow its talent to work outside its walls and Impact would allow talent to work with other promotions,” Meltzer concluded.
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