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What’s the story?
During tonight’s NJPW’s New Year Dash event, Bullet Club leader Kenny Omega decided to make bring a change to his faction as he looked to add another member to the group’s rank, in the form of Jay White. However, White would go on to reject Omega’s offer and hit the Blade Runner on the IWGP US Heavyweight Champion.
In case you didn’t know…
During last year’s NJPW: Power Struggle event former NJPW Young Lion Jay White made his return to the promotion portraying a new gimmick called Switchblade. White, first made his NJPW debut in 2015 but was shortly after sent to a foreign excursion by NJPW management. The 25-year-old shortly after started working for promotions like RevPro and Ring of Honor and during his time with ROH, Jay wrestled in some top profile matches against the likes of Christopher Daniels, Will Ospreay and more.
At this year’s Wrestle Kingdom 12 event White unsuccessfully challenged “The Ace” Hiroshi Tanahashi for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship and failed to win the biggest match of his career so far.
The heart of the matter
During today’s NJPW: New Year’s Dash event the Bullet Club was part of a 10-man tag team match against the team of Ryusuke Taguchi and the rest of the Taguchi Japan faction. The Bullet Club was led by former ROH World Champion Cody Rhodes during the match and following BC’s victory, Cody decided to put a brutal assault on Kenny Omega’s former tag team partner Kota Ibushi who was representing the opposing team.
However, before doing further damage to the former Golden Star, Omega decided to step in and save Ibushi from the assault which eventually led to a nerve-wracking argument between Omega and Cody. The BC leader then decided to put Cody in his place by stating that he is the leader of the faction, not Cody.
Following this segment, Omega decided to address the entire the Bullet Club stable and the NJPW fans as well. And during his promo, Omega claimed that he is sick and tired of the disputes between the members of the Bullet Club and wanted to set things right, thus Omega decided to call out “Switchblade” Jay White and offered him with a Bullet Club tee and asked him to join the faction.
Jay would eventually go on and put on the BC T-Shirt as he and Omega then shared a hug inside the ring, however, Jay White had other ideas for himself as he then hit the Blade Runner on Omega and decided to reject the US Champion’s offer in the process.
What’s next?
It looks like Omega’s next US Title challenger will be non-other than Jay White. This will be the second time White will challenge Omega to a title match having previously wrestled Omega in 2016 for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship.
Author’s Take
I think Jay White is a perfect contender for the IWGP US Title and in my opinion, White rejecting Bullet Club was definitely a great segment and Switchblade should rather play a lone wolf sort of character instead of being in a faction.
