AEW's Will Ospreay Recalls Receiving Offer From WWE To Wrestle In 2016 Tournament

A decade ago, WWE held its inaugural Cruiserweight Classic and introduced the WWE Universe to some of the indie's best cruiserweights. Some of those names would eventually sign with the company, including Cedric Alexander, Mustafa Ali, Johnny Gargano, and Tommaso Ciampa. The CWC would spawn "205 Live".

Will Ospreay was offered a spot in the tournament, but ultimately turned it down. During an episode of "Marking Out with MVP & Dwayne Swayze", Ospreay reflected on the offer. He was wrestling against Kazuchika Okada in RevPro and had faced AJ Styles the night before. Gedo, Tiger Hattori, and Hiroshi Tanahashi were all in attendance. After the show, he spoke with Hattori. "Then WWE called me and they wanted me to be part of the Cruiserweight Classic. I didn't know yet because I had to weigh all my options because I had TNA, which was nowhere near an option for me at the time. New Japan, which I really, really wanted to do because the only thing I wanted to be was a Japanese wrestler. Obviously WWE, I like, didn't really know what to expect. I liked watching NXT. NXT was cool at the time, like the Black and Gold Era was great."

After Styles, Prince Devitt (Finn Balor), Shinsuke Nakamura, Karl Anderson, and Luke Gallows went to WWE, there was an opening for him. He spoke to his mom about how these wrestlers went to WWE because their stock went up by being in NJPW. "I politely declined the offer to be in the Cruiserweight Classic and I said to New Japan that If I could be more a part of them than just being in the Super Juniors. They said 'you know you can do WWE. You're not locked down', and I said, ' I want to be locked down. This is where I want to be. They gave me a contract deal and I spent eight years of my life there."

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit Marking Out with MVP & Dwayne Swayze and provide a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.