On a recent edition of the “AEW Unrestricted” podcast, Kevin Kelly explained his decision to depart New Japan Pro Wrestling.
Kelly announced this past September that he would be leaving NJPW “at some point soon,” but still plans on calling NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 18 on January 4, 2024.
Kelly said, “Because my wife said, ‘I don’t want to be alone anymore.’ I’m not lying. We’ve been together 33 years, married 30. I told her, when the time is right, you tell me and I will stop going to Japan because I’ve been gone weeks at a time, months at a time. Come home briefly, go back weeks at a time. We’ve all missed birthdays and family vacations and those types of things, but when you’re missing Christmas and you’re missing New Years and you’re missing anniversaries and you’re missing everything, it just gets to be too much. So, when this AEW opportunity came around, the first conversation that Tony and I had was about still keeping up on New Japan commitments and he said, ‘Yeah that’s fine, we’ll have Ian or somebody fill in.’ He and I figured it would probably be 12 dates a year and I talked to [my wife] about it, and she was like, I don’t want to be alone anymore. I was like, okay, say no more, that’s it. I talked to New Japan, I talked with Tony. I got these two [shows] that I definitely have to do for New Japan, but after that, I’m just going to be here in the states, here in North America within a couple hours flight. I’ll be gone away from home as much as AEW needs me, but I’ll always be that close. I’ll never be more than half of a day away.”
On a recent edition of his “1 Of A Kind” podcast, WWE Hall of Famer Rob Van Dam expressed his desire to team with HOOK once again after the two had successful matches on AEW television.
As a tag team, RVD and HOOK are undefeated at 2-0.
RVD stated that a fan pitched the team name ‘Smoke & Choke’, which he liked. He said,
“Of course, of course. Everyone is super cool there. Now that I’ve got a little bit of a situation as far as teaming up with HOOK, I feel there is more reason than ever to have me there. I feel good about that as opposed to, I don’t expect to ever hear from them again.”
