Nic Nemeth, the former Dolph Ziggler, hits a traditional league in front of a large audience three months after his WWE release. The free agent market is also rumbling on many other fronts
Three months after his WWE release, former World Champion Dolph Ziggler has returned – with a bang!
Under his real name Nic Nemeth, the 43-year-old made a surprise debut in front of over 27,000 fans at the venerable Tokyo Dome in Japan. He and his brother Ryan mixed it up at Wrestle Kingdom 18, the annual highlight of the traditional Japanese league New Japan Pro Wrestling.
It was the same venue and the same event where Mercedes Moné aka Sasha Banks had heralded the restart after her WWE retirement last year. NJPW has also featured countless North American stars in the past, including Hulk Hogan, Vader, Ric Flair, Chris Jericho, Kenny Omega and many others.
This year in Tokyo, Nemeth also met various prominent representatives of WWE competitor AEW, with whom NJPW has a cooperation.
Former Dolph Ziggler joins NJPW
Nemeth went toe-to-toe with David Finlay, son of Irish wrestling legend Fit Finlay, at the show. Finlay had previously secured NJPW’s newly introduced Global Title in a three-way battle with Jon Moxley (formerly Dean Ambrose) and soon-to-be AEW transfer Will Ospreay.
Finlay – currently leader of the famous “Bullet Club” – is currently being built up by NJPW as the next big international star, a duel with longtime WWE perennial Nemeth is apparently supposed to help.
@THEdavidfinlay × @HEELZiggler “Next Battle?”
Sign up Now & Stay tuned to https://t.co/CeQLGjTmZ5njwk18 NJPW njpwworld pic.twitter.com/AO2znYwWxl
– NJPW WORLD (@njpwworld) January 4, 2024
The three-way match was one of two big matches of the night involving AEW, the second saw top star Kazuchika Okada win the second edition of the “Dream Match” between two high-end technicians against Bryan Danielson, the former Daniel Bryan. In the main event of the show, Tetsuya Naito was crowned the new IWGP World Champion against SANADA.
The former Ziggler was the most prominent victim of a major layoff in WWE three months ago, and now the usual no-show clause for other leagues has expired. He would now also be free for AEW – where brother Ryan was also often active on the undercard – should there be interest there.
Nemeth’s NJPW debut is fueling a currently very active free agent market, due in part to various contracts that expired around the turn of the year.
Andrade and Naomi probably back to WWE – what will become of Mercedes Moné?
AEW introduced former Impact and ROH Women’s Champion Deonna Purrazzo as a new addition on Thursday night, in return Tony Khan’s league loses Mexican Andrade El Idolo: Charlotte Flair’s husband has let his contract expire, announced his departure and is likely to return to WWE.
The same is said to apply to Trinity aka Naomi, who left WWE in the spring of 2022 together with partner Sasha Banks in a dispute: The portal Fightful reports, citing sources at WWE and Trinity’s current employer TNA (the former Impact), that a return campaign is imminent.
TNA, in turn, has promised “one of the biggest signings in league history” this month. Speculation is that it could be another WWE layoff victim (Matt Riddle? Mustafa Ali?) or it could be Nemeth.
According to Fightful, the most prominent free agent Mercedes Moné is said to have recently negotiated with WWE again – but without results. Allegedly, she could turn up elsewhere at any time. It remains to be seen when and where this will happen or whether there will be another twist here too
