Mercedes Mone is sticking around NJPW after finding a lot of success in a short period of time.
Mone made her promotional debut in January at Wrestle Kingdom by confronting KAIRI, only later beating her for the IWGP Women’s Title. The former WWE star successfully defended her IWGP Women’s Championship against Hazuki & AZM at a recent STARDOM show before dropping it on April 23 to Mayu Iwatani.
Mone agreed to a contract extension with NJPW/STARDOM hours before the match took place due to her previous deal expiring after the match. At the time, the contract details were unknown.
This past Sunday night, Mone suffered an injury in the main event of NJPW Resurgence while wrestling Willow Nightingale to crown the first-ever NJPW Strong Women’s Champion. In the bout, Mone suffered what is believed to be a broken ankle when she went for a code red off the top rope and slipped. Plans had to be changed on the fly, with Nightingale going over to win the title.
In the latest edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer reported that Mone inked a long-term deal last month after previously committing to only a few dates at a time.
Meltzer wrote, “Mone had agreed to a longer-term deal with New Japan when her original deal expired on 4/27. We were told that the New Japan Strong championship and belt were created when she agreed to the longer-term deal and both were created for her, after she showed strong drawing power for the San Jose show which sold out the Civic Auditorium.”
It’s still unclear the exact injury Mone is dealing with nor a rough estimate as to when she’ll be able to wrestle again.
We wish her a speedy recovery.
