Stephanie Vaquer Signs With WWE, Expected To Start On NXT Soon
CMLL and NJPW star Stephanie Vaquer is one of the best women’s wrestlers on the planet today. WWE Scouts, however, started to push for the company to sign her after they saw her match with Mercedes Mone (formerly Sasha Banks) back in May. The CMLL star worked a match against Mercedes in AEW, considering the Mexican promotion has a small talent exchange partnership with the company. WWE felt that they could potentially sign her before AEW did so, as her CMLL deal was supposedly coming to an end in the Summer.
Apparently, WWE has been a destination for Vaquer in her career, as she took the call from the company and did not consider another offer. What makes this even more interesting is that she is a decorated champion for CMLL. Until this week, she was holding the CMLL Women’s World Championship and the inaugural CMLL Women’s World Tag Team Championships.
She held the tag titles since their inception just under a year ago. Meanwhile, she held the CMLL Women’s Title for well over 200 days. Both were stripped this week by CMLL as Stephanie told them that she was leaving the company. This tells us that she was likely working with CMLL under a per-date deal of some kind, considering she would not be able to leave randomly until that expired.
It’s possible that they were banking on her to either re-sign with CMLL or assumed she would sign with AEW. This is why NJPW and CMLL reportedly felt blindsided by the move.
WHEN WE CAN EXPECT TO SEE STEPHANIE VAQUER IN WWE
Since she did not do another few matches to drop her CMLL championships, it appears that Stephanie Vaquer will be used pretty soon. The plan is to have her debut on the NXT brand. This seemed to be confirmed when NXT’s creative head, Shawn Michaels, sent a tweet out welcoming her. NXT General Manager Ava also claimed she’d “see her soon.” If that is not confirming she’s going to NXT immediately, we do not know what more proof is needed.
Apparently, Stephanie’s decision to join WWE goes back several weeks. According to Fightful, she was actually in Toronto, Canada, to see the NXT Heatwave event backstage. It’s possible she and WWE came to an agreement then, and she might have even signed her contract there, too. This would make sense, as Triple H and Shawn Michaels would have both been backstage.
It was likely the best place to do it, as all the necessary people who could decide anything she needed or requested before signing a deal were there.
Some people were upset to learn she would be starting on NXT. For those unaware, traditionally, NXT has been seen as WWE’s “developmental” brand. However, several have appeared on the NXT brand without any need to develop their skills. Stephanie Vaquer certainly does not need to improve in the ring, as she is already one of the best female wrestlers of our time.
Most start there because of the way WWE does things. NXT, usually on a smaller scale, exposes talent to where cameras are going to be and how they can best connect with them and the live crowd. There is also another thing that a lot of people do not consider, and a big reason Stephanie Vaquer need to start there.
WHY MANY INTERNATIONAL STARS BEGIN ON NXT
Most of the time, you’ll see someone who isn’t from the United States start on NXT. This includes people like Kairi Sane, Iyo Sky, and Asuka. All of these Japanese women’s wrestlers were well-respected throughout the world. Their in-ring talent was not debatable. Everyone knew they were fantastic. The problem is that they were never exposed to the American wrestling style or the U.S. version of story-based wrestling.
They came from a more athletic form of wrestling, the Japanese Strong Style, which was meant to make things as real as possible. In Japan, they consider professional wrestling a sport, even though many are aware it’s scripted. The same can be said for Mexican wrestling, often referred to as Lucha Libre. Most of it is about displaying incredible athletes doing incredible things.
In America, especially WWE, there is a totally different style. On top of that, as far as in-ring material goes, sometimes people start on the opposite foot and do things backward. In American wrestling, you always lead a run off the ropes with your right foot. You’ll often clothesline people with the right arm too. Sometimes, the opposite is true in Mexico & Japan. This isn’t as common anymore, but it’s still a slight problem when doing a story-based style.
Fightful reported that people like Giulia are also starting on NXT for the same reason. They have mostly wrestled in one country and have not experienced the WWE style and American way of life. NXT is just a starting point for people like Stephanie Vaquer & Giulia. It is not an indictment of how good or bad they are.
