AEW President Tony Khan is interested in bringing top free agent Kota Ibushi to the company.
As we’ve noted, Ibushi officially departed NJPW this week as his contract expired. He will make his GCW debut at The Collective 2023 during WrestleMania 39 Weekend in Los Angeles, on at least two events, and a match against Mike Bailey has already been announced. You can click here for details, and you can click here for NJPW’s statement wishing Ibushi the best in future endeavors.
In an update, it’s been reported that Ibushi has major interest from multiple companies, and Khan touched on this during his Busted Open Radio appearance earlier today.
“There’s a lot of great free agents in the world of pro wrestling, but certainly Kota Ibushi is a great talent,” Khan said. “When you have a name like that, that is certainly somebody everybody in the world of pro wrestling would be very fortunate to have in their promotion. We really wanted to work with him in the past, so I think that is certainly something we’d have to consider.”
For those who missed it, you can click here for what Ibushi had to say about possibly working with AEW this week. The inaugural IWGP World Heavyweight Champion is good friends with AEW World Trios Champion & Executive Vice President Kenny Omega.
Ibushi, who turns 41 in May, has been out of action with a shoulder injury since losing to current IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada in the NJPW G1 Climax Finals on October 21, 2021.
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(H/T to F4Wonline.com for the quote)
