Mercedes Mone Reacts To Tokyo Dome Debut

The first post-WWE match of Mercedes Mone, the former Sasha Banks, is just three weeks away. 

With February 18's NJPW Battle in the Valley in San Jose looming, Mone did her first noteworthy interview since her NJPW debut at Wrestle Kingdom, with NJPW's English website. Among other topics, she was asked about how she thought her debut at the Tokyo Dome—attacking KAIRI after her IWGP Women's World Title defense—went, although she couldn't give her best answer because she hasn't watched it yet.

"I still haven't had the chance to [watch my debut], but it's still taking time to feel real because it's been such a dream of mine," she said. "Not only to perform and wrestle in Japan but to be in the Tokyo Dome." Baks noted that, as a teenager, she was enthralled by the All Japan Women's "Big Egg Show" which took place in the Dome in 1994. "To see the crowd's reactions to seeing those women wrestle, it was like 'wow, I want that someday'." 

Banks said that she was thrilled that the Tokyo Dome was the venue for her debut as her CEO character, which she describes as an evolution from "The Boss" character in WWE. I'm so excited to be part of a group that's so hungry. It's a star in my heart, and it feels so great to be excited about wrestling again."

More broadly, though, she still hasn't fully processed her debut's effects. "I'm still trying to recover from it all," Banks said, noting that traveling to and from Japan requires a serious recovery period, especially with floods of kudos coming from across social media. "It was two weeks ago but I'm still taking it in."