Over the summer, it was widely reported that WWE President Nick Khan was in talks with NJPW officials about the company potentially becoming their official American partner. This would have opened the door to WWE talent working overseas, while top wrestlers from Japan would have started making appearances on the likes of RAW, SmackDown, and NXT.
For whatever reason, it never happened. However, we did learn that talks had begun in the spring and that Daniel Bryan had been a big part of them. His contract was nearing its end and he'd made no secret of the fact he wanted to wrestle overseas; striking a deal with NJPW would have opened the door to that and stopped the former WWE Champion from signing with AEW.
Now, there's exactly where Bryan Danielson is, and the American Dragon recently told In The Kliq that these reports were, in fact, 100% accurate.
"So, I don’t know how far along the talks went but, and I don’t know even if I was the start of them for sure, but one of the things when I was talking to them when WWE was trying to re-sign me was I said, 'I want to be able to go work in Japan,'" he explained. "They were trying to come up with an agreement to where I would be able to go and do that and that sort of thing."
"That was definitely something that was talked about. I don’t know where it went or anything like that. All I know is that now it seems like AEW has a really great relationship with New Japan. So I feel like it couldn’t have gone that well [Laughs]."
Danielson has yet to make his way to Japan, but something tells us it won't be too much longer. If you want a taste of what to expect from that, we'd recommend watching his recent match with Minoru Suzuki; be warned, though, this is the American Dragon and not the Leader of the Yes Movement!