Various: Tama Tonga on AEW Opening NJPW’s “Forbidden Door”, Friday’s NJPW Strong Card, Indies

Feb 12, 2021

Tama Tonga Comments on If NJPW’s “Forbidden Door” with AEW is Completely Open

A recent episode of the Tama’s Island podcast had host Tama Tonga discuss a variety of topics. One of the topics included Tonga believing New Japan Pro Wrestling’s “forbidden door” with AEW is not completely open yet.

“This is why I didn’t say the doors are wide open. I’m just gonna add to that, so Jon Moxley, it’s Jon Moxley and I feel like he can float. He’s the one guy that can float back and forth anywhere and can do business because I don’t feel like his contract is really just AEW. I think he’s open to work, because a lot of guys’ contracts are open to work with AEW and NJPW so if they have that in contract, the boss can’t really say you can’t do that, right? Because it’s in their contract so I believe Moxley’s that guy who has his contract open to work with other promotions so that’s why this was able to happen. Now, with this happening, Tony Khan, I would think he’s a smart dude. Yeah, let it happen on our show because that would boost ratings, that would kill ratings, and if you saw, it did. It did, it was huge. That’s the smart booking. Now is the door open? No. I mean, it has to be another dude you know is only with AEW, that only Tony Khan can say — that’s a big name that Tony Khan can say yes to, that doesn’t have an open contract that he can say yes, or one of our guys that’s only New Japan, that’s only contracted to New Japan that can be like — it has to be one of those guys. It can’t be a free-floater guy. That to me, when that happens, you’ll know the doors [are] open. That’s when I think that is.”

Tonga also said that he was not informed beforehand that KENTA would be making a surprise appearance in AEW and was just as surprised as everyone else when it happened.

“I was so surprised. I didn’t know nothing. I didn’t know anything. I just came in. I didn’t know KENTA was gonna fly all the way from Japan straight to Jacksonville and whip everybody’s ass over there. When I say ‘everybody’, I’m talking about Mox because he’s the only one worth a damn over there, oh sht. Let’s talk that sht right now. I’m about that smoke. Anybody wanna bring some, let’s go. Let’s go. But, to see that happen man, it’s nice. Now, that’s a big deal man because everybody and their mother wants a piece of that action, especially on social media. We got The Good Brothers, not only from AEW, not only from IMPACT but The Good Brothers from WWE chiming in trying to get some of that pie. Oh boy, oh boy.”

Transcript h/t: PostWrestling.com

Full Card for Friday’s Episode of NJPW Strong

New Japan Pro Wrestling recently announced the full card for tonight’s Road to The New Beginning USA 2021 themed episode of NJPW Strong, which airs on New Japan World starting at 10PM EST.

Jordan Clearwater vs. JR Kratos
Clark Connors vs. Bateman
Ren Narita & TJP vs. Team Filthy (Danny Limelight & Chris Dickinson)
KENTA appearance

Misc. Wrestling News & Notes

Ring of Honor announced that Kenny King and Slex have recently signed new contracts with the company.

Women’s promotion Shimmer recently announced that unlike other promotions, they will not be running any events during WrestleMania 37 week this April. The company also announced that they currently do not have any plans to resume events until it is possible for them to do so in their home area of Chicago.

During a recent interview with FOX4 Kansas City, the family of the late Butch Reed stated that they currently believe Reed’s passing was due to COVID-19. The family stated that Reed had tested positive for it “around January 12.”

Impact Wrestling recently announced that they will be launching a new weekly television show called “Before The Impact” on February 16th on AXS TV. Episodes for this new show will be one-hour in length and will air every Tuesday starting at 7PM EST.

Indies wrestler Danny Limelight announced on Twitter that he recently tested positive for the coronavirus. Limelight has been working primarily for AEW, NJPW, and Championship Wrestling of Hollywood in recent months.

One of Joey Ryan’s lawsuits against several of his sexual abuse accusers reportedly was recently dismissed, according to HeelByNature.com. It was reported that Judge Michael W. Fitzgerald of the United States District Court for the Central District of California dismissed Ryan’s lawsuit against three women on February 10th due to Ryan failing to “adequately responded to the OSC” that was issued by the court. It was also reported that Ryan’s lawsuit was dismissed “without prejudice” allowing Ryan the ability to re-file his lawsuit before the statue of limitations expires.