John Cena, Cody Rhodes & Asuka Coming To WWE NXT; Wrestling News October 4th 2023

WWE Hall of Famer Kevin Nash has lauded praise on Natalya, calling her one of the best mat wrestlers (both male and female) in all of WWE!

During the latest episode of his Kliq This podcast, Nash recounted Natalya’s match with Tegan Nox on the September 25th, 2023 edition of Raw and expressed how impressed he was with her. He went on to explain why she should be one of the, if not first, opponents of the company’s latest signing Jade Cargill.

“I was watching Raw, and I watched Natalya wrestle Tegan Nox. Natalya, to me is just amazing because probably as far as mat wrestling skills in the entire company, men included, she probably is in the top five.

She [wrestles Tegan Nox] and she basically puts this girl over. I’m thinking to myself, okay, you got Natalya, you got Jax, you got Ripley, you got Jade. The women’s division, those are all five-foot-nine, five-foot-ten…right now, I would have Natalya with Jade because if you can get Jade to do 30% of the mat work that Natalya and still keep her high impact s**t, she’s already got the look.”

Nash went on to equally praise Cargill and specifically her “superhero” look. Nash even claimed that she looked like more of a star than Dwayne Johnson during his early days with WWE.

h/t to Fightful

Adam Copeland has revealed how those within WWE have reacted positively to his signing with All Elite Wrestling.

In a new interview with Sports Illustrated’s Justin Barrasso, the WWE Hall of Famer expressed his thanks to WWE despite jumping ship to AEW. Copeland opened up about how many within the company have since congratulated him on the move and how ultimately, they aren’t angry about his decision.

“I am so thankful for every aspect of my career, and I’ll be forever thankful for the WWE,” said Copeland. “It was the only place I wanted to work. We reached a place where we’d done all we could do together. And I guarantee you this–they’re not mad. I’m not mad.

I’ve received so many texts from the office, from the travel department, from the talent relations department, from the music department, from the performers, from the big suits, and none of them are mad. They’re happy for me. And I’m happy. They’re going to continue to crush it, too. And I have more of an opportunity to help the entire wrestling business in AEW.”

Adam Copeland has opened up about the potential of competing in New Japan Pro-Wrestling and a possible match with Kazuchika Okada.

The Rated R Superstar spoke to Justin Barrasso of Sports Illustrated following his AEW debut at WrestleDream this past weekend. Among the various topics discussed, Copeland detailed his desire to wrestle for New Japan Pro-Wrestling and particularly at Wrestle Kingdom match at the Tokyo Dome against Kazuchika Okada!

“I’ve never wrestled at Wrestle Kingdom,” said Copeland. “I’ve never wrestled at Tokyo Dome. How about a match against Kazuchika Okada? That would be pretty cool. I’m pretty excited by that.

How about Jon Moxley? Hell yeah. A singles match in AEW against Bryan Danielson? Miro? Claudio Castagnoli? Kenny Omega? Will Ospreay? Adam Page? Chris Jericho? Malakai Black? FTR in a tag? Teaming with Darby against the Young Bucks? Facing Darby? Facing Sting? A promo battle with Eddie Kingston?

The possibilities, they’re keeping me awake at night. These new matchups are all super exciting. It all starts next week against Luchasaurus.”

The man who will replace Kevin Kelly as the Lead English Broadcast Commentator for New Japan Pro-Wrestling has been confirmed.

21-year-old Walker Stewart announced via his X account that he will be taking on the role, starting at NJPW Fighting Spirit Unleashed in Las Vegas later this month. The news was first reported by Super J-Cast two weeks ago.

Stuart started his pro wrestling commentary career over two years ago at just 19 years old and is primarily known for his work in promotions across the United States including GCW, CZW, and Reality of Wrestling.

Kevin Kelly announced that he would be leaving his commentary position at New Japan last month in order to spend more time with his wife. He will continue to announce for the promotion’s Japan-based events over the next few months, including their Destruction In Ryogoku event on October 9th.

Kelly’s final New Japan event at the commentary booth will be the 2024 New Year’s Dash the day after Wrestle Kingdom 18 next January. The 56-year-old will maintain his position as lead commentator for AEW Collision for the foreseeable future.

It’s official, and here’s my statement.

I’m excited to connect further with NJPW fanatics across the world as we dive deeper into our loves for professional wrestling.

See you soon @njpwglobal 👋

Signed ✍️

-WS#grateful #njpw #njpwworld #njfsu #njdest pic.twitter.com/Oh1RHBX5A7

— Walker Stewart (@VelvetVoiceWS) October 4, 2023

Will Ospreay is set to return to IMPACT Wrestling for the first time in six years later this month and could potentially challenge for the promotion’s top title!

‘The Assassin’ has already been announced to be competing at the promotion’s Bound For Glory pay-per-view against ‘Speedball’ Mike Bailey as well as their Turning Point special event in Newcastle, England later this month.

However, the promotion has now announced Ospreay will also wrestle on their post-Bound For Glory TV tapings on October 22nd against Josh Alexander. Interestingly, the match has a stipulation where if Alexander beats Alex Shelley for the IMPACT World Championship at Bound For Glory, it will become his first title defense.

Ospreay has had a busy 2023, having competed for the likes of NJPW, AEW, Pro Wrestling NOAH, Rev Pro, OTT, Rixe Catch, PROGRESS, and the now-defunct 1PW over the past 10 months.

BREAKING: @Walking_Weapon will face @WillOspreay the day after #BoundForGlory at #BoundForGloryFallout on October 22 at Cicero Stadium in Chicago, and if Alexander wins at Bound For Glory it'll be a World Title match!

Get tickets HERE: https://t.co/hV4PXMSjUx pic.twitter.com/D7vVgq2mQ3

— IMPACT (@IMPACTWRESTLING) October 4, 2023

Bobby Lashley has explained why his time as leader of The Hurt Business is an “extreme highlight” of his esteemed career.

In an interview with 100.7 The Bay, Lashley reflected on the legacy of The Hurt Business and opened up about why he looks back especially fondly on his time as both WWE Champion and leader of the faction alongside MVP, Shelton Benjamin and Cedric Alexander.

“I never put things as this is better than that. But I could put a category of some of my extreme highlights of my career. And, of course, winning a WWE Championship is one of those.

But I put the Hurt Business right up there because it was something that just moved a lot of people in a very challenging time because we were running it during the pandemic and we were running it during like COVID and everything was going all over the place. And it was that one thing that you can turn on TV and just get a refreshing get a good feeling about.

There’s so many people who call, send me DMS, sent me messages and everything and talk to me about how impactful that was for them. So and then and then just the group of people that I was with, Shelton Benjamin, Cedric, and MVP, those three guys were good friends. They were close friends. And it’s always it’s always exciting when you’re able to do big things with people that are close to you.

So, of course, that time of my career was and will always be something that I hold near and dear to my heart.”

h/t to WrestlingNewsCo

Prince Nana has revealed the origins behind his bizarre dance to Swerve Strickland’s entrance theme, which has since become a viral meme.

Nana recently appeared as a guest on Talk Is Jericho and during his conversation with host Chris Jericho, the topic of ‘The Nana’ came up. The 44-year-old revealed that dance came from a spur-of-the-moment celebration after receiving good news from the AEW office. A few weeks later, he decided to do the dance during an entrance and it’s stuck ever since.

“The dance, how that came about was, I got some good information from the AEW office, I believe it was during the Canada trip or after that because Canada took a lot out of everybody. I love Canada. I was in my room, got some good news, and next thing you know, I put on Instagram, I put on the Swerve song, and I just started dancing that same dance. I did the same dance, I tape it, went maybe two weeks.

When I initially walked to the ring, I had a little pep in my step, but maybe two weeks (later), I looked at the video and said, ‘I’m going to do this dance.’ I did it one night and boom, history was made. Since then, every week people are requesting me to do it. Did it in London in front of 80,000 people. We’re getting memes, we’re getting people doing the challenge. It’s definitely a great thing.”

h/t to Fightful

WWE has posted the main event match from this week’s Raw to its YouTube channel in full!

The headline bout saw Tommaso Ciampa challenge WWE Intercontinental Champion Gunther in one of the champion’s best title defenses yet! The 16-minute war ultimately ended with Gunther retaining his title and attempting to beat Ciampa down with his Imperium stablemates, only for the returning Johnny Gargano to make the save.

Check out the full match above and let us know your thoughts by sharing on Facebook or Twitter using the buttons down below!

Matt Riddle has announced his first business venture following his WWE release last month.

The former United States Champion shared a post via his Instagram Story announcing that he will be launching his own strain of cannabis known as “Riddle OG.” There are currently no details on when or where the strain will be available.

Prior to his WWE release, Riddle was embroiled in controversy over an incident that took place at JFK Airport in early September. In an Instagram post that was quickly deleted, Riddle alleged that he was sexually assaulted by a Port Authority police officer.

A few days ago, video footage emerged of Riddle at the airport via TMZ which showed him acting disorderly in a very drunken state. A witness of the scene told TMZ that he was “incredibly obnoxious” as well as “extremely loud and rude.”

Riddle made his final appearance on WWE programming on the September 4th edition of RAW where he and Drew McIntyre lost a tornado tag team match to The Viking Raiders. On September 22nd, he announced he was no longer with WWE.

A new update has provided backstage details on the long-awaited return of Johnny Gargano earlier this week!

The former NXT Champion following the main event of Raw this week, seemingly reforming beloved NXT tag team DIY with Tomasso Ciampa in the process. The two hit their Meeting In The Middle tag team finisher on Ludwig Kaiser of Imperium as the show went off the air.

Now, more insight has been given into Gargano’s return to WWE programming. PWInsider report that the return was a late creative decision by WWE and that plans were only locked in late over the weekend, with Gargano being brought to Raw on Monday and being kept hidden from the vast majority.

Gargano returned to the ring back in July and competed in four matches across various live events in July and September. All four matches were against Omos and resulted in a losing effort on Gargano’s end each time.

In their long-awaited Street Fighter battle, Kenny Omega managed to defeat UFC legend Demetrious Johnson!

The showdown went down last night and was streamed exclusively on the Crown Twitch channel. Omega ultimately emerged victory after victories in the first and third rounds, winning an undetermined amount of money for the Hull’s Haven charity which is based in Omega’s home state of Manitoba, Canada.

The first round fought under no restrictions where Omega took the lead but as a result, was forced to use a keyboard/Nintendo 64 controller hybrid in the second. Johnson evened the score thanks to Omega’s disadvantage and initially fought in round three with a disadvantage of his own, but it was eventually decided there would be no restrictions for an even contest – leading to Omega getting the win.

Inside the squared circle, meanwhile, Omega last competed at AEW WrestleDream where he, Kota Ibushi and Chris Jericho lost a 6-man tag team match to Sammy Guevara, Konosuke Takeshita and Will Ospreay.

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WWE is bringing in the big guns for their head-to-head clash with AEW Dynamite next week!

During last night’s NXT, it was announced that four major stars would be appearing on the black and gold brand next week. Coincidentally, NXT will be going head-to-head with AEW Dynamite that night, with AEW having already announced Saraya vs. Hikaru Shida for the AEW Women’s World Title and Adam Copeland vs. Luchasaurus for their ‘Title Tuesday’ show next week.

First, it was announced that former record-breaking NXT Women’s Champion Asuka will return to NXT to take on rising star Roxanne Perez. Later, it was revealed that Carmelo Hayes will take on Bron Breakker in next week’s main event with John Cena standing in Hayes’ corner whilst The Bloodline’s Paul Heyman will support Breakker from the sidelines.

But the announcements were done there. It was also announced that Cody Rhodes will appear on the program to make a major announcement. Whilst the company is billing this as Rhodes’ first-ever NXT appearance, this is in fact not the case. Cody competed several times on the ‘game show’ era of NXT back in 2010/11 and even competed in black and gold NXT in 2012.

Morning everyone, hope you’ve had a great week so far!

Welcome back to the TJRWrestling live blog! I’ll be with you from 7am to 1pm EST covering the latest stories & breaking news from WWE, AEW, NJPW and elsewhere across the wrestling world!

Today’s top stories are:

• John Cena, Cody Rhodes & Asuka Coming To WWE NXT
• Kenny Omega Defeats Demetrious Johnson (In Street Fighter)
  
• Backstage Update On WWE Return Of Johnny Gargano