News

Huge Stipulation Added To Jay White-Eddie Kingston NJPW Match

By Alex Podgorski • Published 16th February 2023
Jay White

Eddie Kingston and Jay White are upping the ante for their upcoming singles match at NJPW Battle in the Valley.

Eddie Kingston’s gimmick for the past several months has seen him challenge wrestlers from various Japanese promotions. As a huge fan of King’s Road and Strong Style, Kingston has been AEW’s go-to guy for crosspromotional matches with NOAH, DDT, and New Japan.

But instead of fighting a Japanese wrestler, now he’ll be fighting one from New Zealand.

Eddie Kingston and Jay White have been teasing a confrontation for months now but it was postponed time and again for different reasons. Now their match is finalized and will take place this upcoming Saturday at NJPW’s Battle in the Valley.

But it won’t just be a straight singles match. Jay White announced during a phone conversation on Wrestling Observer Live that this match has been changed to a loser leaves New Japan match.

A few days ago, Jay White lost a loser leaves Japan match to Hikuleo, meaning he had to leave the country he was wrestling in for several years. But New Japan has an American affiliate sub-promotion called Strong, which is based out of California. It’s not New Japan proper, but it still technically falls under the New Japan banner.

So if Jay White loses this match, he will never be allowed to wrestle for New Japan in any capacity ever again. Conversely, it also means that Eddie Kingston will be forbidden from wrestling on Strong (where he has been wrestling for some time now), and also won’t be able to jump to the “main” NJPW roster either.

NJPW Battle in the Valley takes place this Saturday, February 18th. Aside from this match between Kingston and White, there are some other very exciting matches announced.

These include:

  • Zack Sabre, Jr. vs. Clark Connors for NJPW World Television Championship
  • KAIRI vs. Mercedes Mone for the IWGP Women’s Championship; and
  • The 15th* singles match between Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kazuchika Okada

*not including one pre-Rainmaker match from 2010