Ever since No Rolls Barred/WrestleTalk crossover star Paul ‘The Game’ Levesque took over as head of WWE creative, the usually insular company has begun to finally open itself up to other promotions.
Recently Shinsuke Nakamura was allowed to participate in the Great Muta’s retirement tour in Pro Wrestling NOAH, while AJ Styles hype man and Good Brother Karl Anderson was allowed to defend his NEVER Openweight Championship at NJPW’s flagship event Wrestle Kingdom.
Anderson is a particularly interesting case, since he is the only person in recent memory to not only carry another promotion’s belt while in the company, but to actively defend it and be acknowledged as its champion.
Add in the confusion around Sasha Banks’ Wrestle Kingdom appearance, and it’s enough to make you wonder: is WWE knocking on a forbidden door of its own?
While we probably won’t be seeing Roman Reigns: IWGP Champion any time soon, it’s possible that we could see more WWE stars head East in the coming months.
With that in mind, here are eight more WWE stars who could appear in NJPW throughout 2023:
AJ Styles
If WWE wants to start building bridges in Japan, it could do a lot worse for an ambassador than Mr Gaijin himself.
Styles’ post-TNA NJPW run was a big part of what made him such a hot commodity when he eventually made the leap to WWE in 2016.
It’s not hard to see why; Styles had been the first American IWGP Champion since Brock Lesnar in 2005, and he was also the de facto leader of that weird club all those mid-2010s wrestling nerds wouldn’t shut up about.
Imagine the crowd pop at Wrestle Kingdom 18 (assuming crowd pops are legal by then) as Styles comes out to face one of his old enemies like Okada or Naito.
That could translate to big money for NJPW, and generate bigger international exposure for the company than they’re ever likely to get elsewhere (sorry, Kenneth).
All in all, as far as bargaining chips go there isn’t really anybody on the WWE roster who is quite as integral to the legacy of NJPW as AJ Styles.
Well, maybe one person…
Finn Balor
If it wasn’t for Prince Devitt, you’d have to identify American NJPW fans by smell alone, and for that he deserves our gratitude.
The man who created the most over villainous wrestling faction since the nWo would be a great get for NJPW, who could use WWE’s partnership with the company as an opportunity to explore its modern roots.
The current iteration of the Bullet Club has become so large and unwieldy, with members and splinter factions across multiple promotions.
Bringing Finn back into the fold, even for a brief run, would be a great way to help tie some of those loose strands back together, and turn the Club back into something that the average wrestling fan is actually capable of understanding.
Let’s get him in there against Jay White, as a symbolic meeting of the group’s origins vs its current state.
Better yet, let Finn rechristen the Judgement day as the “true” Bullet Club, to give him some backup as he goes into battle against his old faction (and also to potentially get Dominik in the G1 somewhere down the line, because that would make me laugh a lot).
Seth Rollins
Unlike a lot of other people on this list, there isn’t really a clear justification for Seth to go to Japan other than “I really really want him to.”
I want him to go over there with his insane laugh and ridiculous blouses and be the most insufferably gaijin prick he can possibly be.
Seth is a great heel, and he never really gets to play one because any time he does the crowd just starts going “Ohhhhhhh OHHH OHH OHHHH” and cheering for him to kill his face opponent.
Japan would afford him an opportunity to actually get those boos he craves, as this cocky American goes in and disrespects the culture with his boisterousness and absurd blazers.
Because he doesn’t exactly have a ton of history in NJPW, there’s only one thing you can do with him really: put him in the G1 and run absolutely wild. For me? As a treat?
Let WWE send over one of its best pure wrestlers, do do some great pure wrestling, in one of the greatest pure wrestling promotions in the world.
Asuka
The tag team partnership of Asuka and Kairi Sane was one of the best things to happen to the Empress of Tomorrow since her initial undefeated NXT run.
Unfortunately for all you Joshi dweebs, Sane’s run in the big dub came to an end when Bayley… I guess murdered her?
Look I know the pandemic era was a weird time, but I’m pretty sure I’m remembering this right: during a match between Asuka and Sasha Banks for the Raw Women’s Championship in July 2020, Bayley ran interference by appearing on the titantron and beating Kairi to death against a garage door to help Sasha retain the title (Sane left the company shortly after, so in kayfabe I’m pretty sure she’s dead now).
That’s real friendship.
What better way for WWE to extend an olive branch to NJPW by sending its top female Japanese star over to have seven shades of hell beaten out of her by the ghost of her former friend, aka KAIRI, aka the first ever IWGP Women’s Champion?
It couldn’t come at a better time for Asuka either, who has been a little rudderless on the main roster without any really engaging storylines to take part in, or a good solid nemesis to face off against.
Not to mention the fact that this whole “women’s wrestling” thing is sort of new territory for NJPW, so why not give it an early shot in the arm by putting on a marquee match with the person who is essentially the face of Japanese Women’s wrestling in America?
Bayley
Hey, speaking of Bayley.
Sasha Banks wasn’t the only Golden Role Model to make an appearance at Wrestle Kingdom 17.
Sure, Bayley was just in the audience for emotional support, but still, reports that Bayley would be accompanying Banks to Japan got the wheels in our brains turning.
It’s well documented that Bayley and Banks are extremely close friends, and if Banks is making the jump then what’s to stop her best bud from tagging along?
Sure, seeing Banks go up against the women of Japan sounds like a great prospect, but do you know what wrestling fans like even more than brand new match ups?
That’s right: things that they recognise.
Sure, Bayley/Banks was pretty good when it happened in Brooklyn, but imagine if it happened in the Tokyo Dome.
That’s got to be worth five stars, surely.
Rey Mysterio
Hey, did you know that Rey Mysterio has only competed in NJPW twice: both in the summer of 2018, where he competed in two six-man tag team matches with the likes of Hiroshi Tanahashi, Justin Thunder Liger, Adam Page, KUSHIDA, and freakin’ Kazuchika Okada?
I did; I’ve always known that, and I didn’t just find it out in the course of writing this list.
He was rumored to have even more matches scheduled, including a single’s match against Liger, but unfortunately had to pull out due to injury.
Not long after that, Mysterious Raymond re-signed with WWE, dashing our hopes of even more flippy goodness from the masked menace.
Surely the company would be eager to get Rey back on the card – this time with WWE’s blessing and support – to tie up some of the loose booking ends they laid down all those years ago?
Like Mysterio himself, his time in the company was short and sweet, but more than lends itself to some great high-profile match up were he ever to return.
Naomi
When Sasha Banks and Naomi walked out of a taping of WWE Raw in May of 2022, they became inexorably linked in the minds of wrestling fans… for about six months.
By the end of 2022 it had become clear that Banks would be featured at Wrestle Kingdom 17, while Naomi would most likely be returning to WWE to be with her husband (card subject to change).
There’s nothing wrong with that – both women should go wherever they’re most comfortable, and not bend to the whims of wrestling fans who only know as much of the story as Sean Ross Sapp’s sources are willing to tell them – but you can’t deny that it lays the foundation for a good interpromotional feud.
Sasha as the big star who could potentially revolutionise women’s wrestling in Japan, but at the expense of the career of her former tag team partner, who she convinced to leave the company that made their careers before abandoning her for a better gig.
That’s real drama, and is an easy story to tell across both companies.
Also – and I’m not entirely sure how this would work – but imagine if Banks joins Bullet Club, while Naomi joins her husband in the Bloodline? Then it isn’t just the story of two women, but a war between rival gangs.
Actually, yeah, screw it, while we’re on the subject…
Roman Reigns
Because if you’re gonna go, you might as well go hard.
Reigns might not have quite as much business as some others on this list being in Japan, but he’s also the biggest full time wrestler in WWE by a country mile, so it’s not like they’re going to say no.
The major benefit of sending their top guy over is that WWE gets to demonstrate its faith in the partnership, letting the new kid have a quick go with its favorite toy to prove that they really do want to be friends.
Plus a nice little side-effect of having Roman wrestle in NJPW is that it helps give him a little of that pedigree that some often accuse him of missing (as opposed to your “proper wrestlers” like Cody, Finn, Styles and Otis).
The only major limitation here (as we saw with the Forbidden Door situation) is that sending Roman over immediately creates big, obvious political problems when it comes to who’s allowed to win and lose matches.
All I’m saying is maybe don’t expect a clean finish against Okada any time soon.
Hey, is EVIL available?
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