At one point, Davey Boy Smith Jr. was enjoying tag team success with his partner, Lance Archer, in New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW). The team, named Killer Elite Squad and aligned with Suzuki-Gun, tore up the heavyweight tag division.
Then, last month, Davey Boy Smith Jr. announced that would be leaving NJPW.
In an interview with The Hannibal TV, Smith Jr. opened up about why he decided to leave.
Unwinnable Situation
After having received fewer and fewer dates from the promotion, Smith Jr. admitted that he was “in a situation where I couldn’t win.”
He explained that “New Japan, towards the end, were only giving me four tours a year. What they had told me or expressed to me was that there was no way they could increase the workload of KES, Lance Archer and myself as a tag team.”
Ultimately, the difficult choice to leave had to treated as a business decision. One that he admitted had to be made for his future.
“I felt that the tag team with Lance Archer and myself had expired, and we did all that we could in Japan and in the USA, because we are just not that very well known over here or Canada as a tag team.”
“That’s News To Me”
Smith Jr. pointed to an incident with NJPW booker, Gedo, playing an unfortunate contributing factor.
He explained that when they came to NJPW, circa 2017, Lance Archer would get injured and needed emergency back surgery. Despite this, he was assured that would be booked for the remainder of the tour. However, things didn’t transpire that way.
“I was told that I was going to be on the rest of the remainder of that tour, and I was told by the new person in the office named Saito that I was going to be on the next tour. That was a little over four weeks,” Smith Jr. explained.
“He gave me a schedule and I wasn’t on the Super Juniors tour. I think I was on something in June. So, when I went home, they had owed me merchandise money from that tour, and they said ‘okay you’re coming back next month?’ I said yeah I’ll be back there. I went home and was waiting for my flight, and no one gave me any flight information. I sent the office lady and email and said where’s my flight, and she said well did you talk to Gedo? You’re not on the tour. I said well, that’s news to me.”
He shared that he wished NJPW had just been honest with him. If they had, he simply would have been able to seek bookings elsewhere—something he would have been okay with doing.
H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.
