Mercedes Moné Says Joining NJPW Was “Easy Decision”

Ahead of her NJPW in-ring debut, Mercedes Moné has explained why she feels like it was an easy decision to join NJPW.

Ever since she chose to walk away from WWE in May 2022, there have been questions about what Mercedes Moné was going to do next in pro wrestling. While she spent time doing some acting, modeling, traveling, and other things in her life, fans were consumed with trying to figure out what she would do next in pro wrestling.

As 2022 came to a close, it was revealed that Moné was going to appear at New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Wrestle Kingdom 17 event on January 4th and that’s what she did. Moné debuted in NJPW by getting right in the face of IWGP Women’s Champion KAIRI (formerly Kairi Sane in WWE). Moné dropped KAIRI and made her intentions known that she was coming for the title.

Later tonight at the NJPW Battle In The Valley event in San Jose, California, Mercedes Moné will challenge KAIRI for that IWGP Women’s Title in a highly anticipated match.

In an interview with Under The Ring, Mercedes Moné spoke abut being a part of NJPW.

“This is such a huge honor for me. It made it a really easy decision to go to New Japan to help kickstart this women’s division for this company. With New Japan being the biggest pro wrestling company in Japan, it was just an easy, easy decision to be like, ‘This is the place that I want to be.'”

“I grew up watching New Japan, I grew up watching Pro-Wrestling NOAH and all these Japanese women’s wrestling [companies] growing up. So this was such an easy decision. It’s a dream come true for me. I think [NJPW Battle in the Valley] is just going to create so much magic and so much history for women’s wrestling that I just want everyone around the world to be like, ‘This is the company that I want to be in.'”

Mercedes Moné also expressed an interest in competing in the all-women’s promotion STARDOM as well. Bushiroad owns both NJPW and STARDOM.

“Oh my god, I see it as one of the greatest potential companies in the world right now. I just keep seeing it growing and growing and getting bigger. I’ve been hearing about STARDOM for years. Just knowing that it’s an all-women’s promotion with the greatest women’s wrestlers all over the world, [moreso] now that you have Mercedes Mone in the game, as well.”

“I think just watching, I’ve been watching it for the past couple of months, really fine-tuning up, ‘Who do I want to face? Who is the best out there?’ They have some of the top wrestlers I have ever seen. I’m just so excited to introduce the American audience to the style of STARDOM women. I think just giving them the opportunity to show what they can do to a global-scale audience is just going to open up the doors for women’s women’s wrestling all over the world.

“I think they have the greatest wrestling, so I’m excited to be a part of it and just to expand this broadened audience to something so different that they’ve never seen before.”

Moné also revealed this week that she received encouraging text messages from WWE’s Triple H and William Regal, both of whom played a huge role in her development as a wrestler.