Some behind-the-scenes news on one of the more interesting stories to begin 2024.
NXT star Charlie Dempsey, son of the great William Regal, recently faced-off against Katsuhiko Nakajima for the Triple Crown Championship in AJPW. The bout marked a rare collaboration between WWE and another promotion.
According to Hochi News, WWE reached out to Simon Kelly Inoki, who negotiated Dempsey’s participation in the AJPW match. Simon is the son-in-law of Japanese legend Antonio Inoki, the founder of NJPW who passed away in October of 2022. He is the current director of the Inoki Genome Federation and was a former president of NJPW.
Dempsey would lose against Nakajima, and has since returned to the states to wrestle for NXT.