NJPW’s El Phantasmo Reveals He Was Offered AEW Contract, Cody Rhodes Didn’t Answer His Messages

It appears that a current Bullet Club member almost signed a contract with AEW. During a round of media to promote WrestleKingdom 18, El Phantasmo (ELP) revealed that in the early days of AEW, he very nearly signed with the company instead of New Japan. “It’s also funny, they [NJPW] originally only offered me a three month deal to do Best of Super Juniors and maybe Super Junior Tag League but that was also right as AEW was starting. I wrestled Cody Rhodes and Tony Khan was there and they offered me a deal to go to AEW. But that was before anybody knew what it was and I went from one day being an unknown indie wrestler in the UK to having multiple contract offers,” ELP said in an interview with Speaking of Strong Style. 

“At the end of the day, New Japan asked first and that’s what my decision came down to. They asked first, they wanted me first. It was funny, I was texting Cody Rhodes on WhatsApp and he didn’t respond. And then I was like, “Cody, like, I kinda need to talk to you,’ and he didn’t respond. Then Rocky [Romero] got the Japanese visa and they were like ‘we want you with Bullet Club.’ I was like, ‘sh-t I can’t say no to that.’ But if you ever talk to Cody he’s like ‘ah, I only ever use WhatsApp for one person.’ Because I don’t have like iMessage or anything. Tony Khan was like, ‘hey, what’s going on?’ and I was like, ‘well, he didn’t respond to me on WhatsApp.’ And then he f—ing called Cody backstage in front of everybody and was like, ‘what’s going on with ELP?’ I was like ‘dude, you didn’t respond on WhatsApp.’ And he was like, ‘sh-t, you’re the only person I talk to on WhatsApp!’ Kind of a funny story.”

ELP has appeared in AEW twice since then, once at last year’s inaugural AEW/NJPW Forbidden Door pay-per-view teaming with the Young Bucks against Dudes with Attitudes (Sting, Darby Allin, and Shingo Takagi, the other at this year’s event defeating fellow Canadian, Stu Grayson. He’s a former three-time IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champion and one half the of the current NJPW STRONG Openweight Tag Team champions.