As was announced, Stephanie Vaquer is leaving CMLL and NJPW for personal reasons. She has been stripped of the CMLL World and Tag Team Titles. In reality, she is joining another company.
After it was reported that she was WWE-bound, Shawn Michaels seemingly confirmed on social media, this was after Vaquer dropped the NJPW Strong Women’s Title to Mercedes Mone at Forbidden Door last month. She had been praised leading into and coming out of the bout.
While speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer noted CMLL and NJPW were upset with how Vaquer handled her departure as she had planned dates with them and other promotions that she canceled to go to WWE.
Meltzer said, “There’s a lot. This has actually been a really huge story because you know the nature of how it all went down. Obviously, she just did Forbidden Door. Both AEW and WWE wanted her. She was leaning towards WWE, and she told CMLL. I believe she told New Japan, but it may have been that CML told New Japan, but New Japan and CMLL have been aware of this before she signed…..When she had told them (CMLL), they basically asked her and said, ‘We won’t stand in your way or anything like that, if you want to go you can go, but just do business the right way’. She’s got the tag titles in CMLL, the CMLL singles title, and it was basically, go to San Jose, where she’s been advertised for months, and drop the title there, drop the tag title, and we’ll do a farewell.”
Meltzer continued, “The feeling was that they expected that of her and basically told her ‘Look, they (WWE) want you, and they (WWE) may not want you to do that, but you haven’t signed yet, so you can just tell them, I want to go out the right way’. On Monday when she signed, she told them that Tuesday, which was last night (July 9) in Guadalajara was her last night, and she wouldn’t be coming to Arena Mexico on Friday, she wouldn’t do any of the dates….The idea was to come to San Jose and drop the title, and she didn’t do that.….. Last night, in her last night, she beat Tessa Blanchard….CMLL was very upset over her because of what happened, and also, they had never been targeted in this way by WWE.”
Meltzer recalled WWE signing Mistico and Alberto Del Rio in the past, but not in the same manner as they got to finish up their committed CMLL dates and do it in the right way.
Meltzer continued, “New Japan was very upset because when they first announced the show in San Jose, she was in the first batch of people announced, and they have been advertised for months. It’s kind of like their basic thing is you’ve been advertised for months for this show in a championship match, and then five days before the show, you pull out, and you’re the champion.”
There is speculation that she could attend WWE house shows this weekend, but that hasn’t been confirmed.
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