Former MLW star EJ Nduka made his debut for All Elite Wrestling at Saturday’s AEW Dark tapings from Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida. He faced Konosuke Takeshita in a match that will soon air on the AEW Youtube channel.
Nduka had two tryouts for WWE before signing with the company in August 2019. He trained at the Performance Center but was released less than two years later.
He signed with Major League Wrestling shortly thereafter as part of that year’s MLW Open Draft. Known as The Judge, Nduka held the MLW World tag team championships with Calvin Tankman. His MLW contract expired earlier this month and he decided to test himself on the free agency market.
Here are some photos of Nduka’s AEW debut, courtesy of Jacob Cohen:
Nduka is friends with AEW TBS Champion, Jade Cargill. They attended Jacksonville University together and broke into the business on the very same day.
During a November 2021 interview with SEScoops correspondent Samira, “So, Jade and I, we both went to college together. Ironically, we knew of each other, but we didn’t know each other. In college, she played basketball and I played football. We actually got close when we got in the industry the same day.”
“We had our tryout at the WWE at the PC (Performance Center). She was literally right behind me in line. We started chopping it up and ever since then we’ve just been really good friends and we train whenever we get a chance. They were in Orlando for the AEW Dynamite, so we got an opportunity to train.”