AEW TBS Champion Mercedes Mone vs. NJPW Strong Women’s Champion Stephanie Vaquer in a title-for-title bout will take place at the AEW x NJPW: Forbidden Door 2024 pay-per-view event on Sunday night from the UBS Arena in Elmont, NY.
Mercedes discussed her free agency journey with BT and Sal on WFAN. Here are the highlights:
On the decision: “In a sense, I enjoyed it, because I was like, ‘I can’t believe how many companies want me so bad and how many lucrative deals were put on the table. Which one do I choose? Which one do I want? It was also scary at the same time because WWE is WWE. I was like, ‘Do I go back?’ My heart was saying, ‘Don’t go back, go forward.’ I kept hearing that in my head. ‘Keep going forward.’ They keep offering me things and they keep asking me to come back. ‘Mercedes, go forward.’ New Japan came about. CMLL. AEW. Just having the conversation with Tony (Khan). It took about two years of having conversations. ‘Will this work? Is this what I want? Is this what my heart wants?’ Finally, I went to All In at Wembley. Being in the crowd and seeing how 80,000 fans, it wasn’t WrestleMania, it was AEW All In. I was like, ‘This is where I want to be. I want to be here and this company feels aligned with my soul.’ We kept talking and I got the most amazing contract in wrestling history.”
On whether she needed to experience the show live to really make her decision: “I can watch it on TV all day, every week, but I had to be there in person and get a sense of the talent, the audience, and a sense of how they all operated. Out there, I was like, ‘this is so amazing.’ To have 80,000 fans in UK, it let me know wrestling is so special and there doesn’t have to be one place for wrestling.”
H/T to Fightful for the transcription
