New World Pro-Wrestling - The New Alternative

[PWC2017]

Getting Down to Business - 4​

Once the deal with Amazon was announced Manson had initial internal meetings with Cary Silkin as well as Harold Meji to go over prospective names for events. With Manson, the usual term came up, 'Make it make sense'. For him, a lot Wrestling event names didn't make sense. They were either tied to a type of gimmick or just felt random. I mean 'Resurgence'? What has that got to do with anything.?

Manson had a few ideas, some that were decent and some that were a little more on the nose but it was never going to be perfect and started talking to Seaport about trademarking them. The initial names Manson liked and got the ball rolling trademarking were;

• WrestleDynasty - Manson was happy that NJPW owned the name and trademark. Manson felt it could be a good 'Flagship' event every year.
• SuperClash - Another one that hadn't been trademarked. Manson liked the name.
• May/Day - Pretty simple title - a good yearly event in early May. Potentially a Cinco de Mayo event
• Collision/Course - A brilliant PPV name, simple, sporty vibes.
• SummerRush - Manson had loved the name GrandSlam but AEW had taken that. SummerRush sounded a bit on the nose but Manson wanted something that could be a staple for August/September each year.
• The Grand Event - Simple, nothing major to think about.
• The One - Same as 'The Event'.
• RingKingz / RingQueenz - A tournament style PPV.
• ThunderStruggle - Feels more like a Japanese style PPV name. Meji agreed.
• GrandSummit - Same as the above, Manson and Meji wanted more options for the Far Eastern events from January 2026.
• Genesis - As per above.
• Battle - Manson felt this could be the name of one of the weekly cards. Have the name of the town / City next to the name Battle could be interesting concept.

There were a few more that the team discussed but Manson wanted to get a few names in early so that the team had a few names to work with.
Manson spent most days in the office thinking of ideas, plans for the promotion. One of them was a 'Face/Off' style of event the day before the PPV where the main card could come out in front of an audience and cut a promo on each other. Something different and most importantly, more content.

April turned into May and the NWA and IWGP 'Rosters' were the next plans for the team.

 

[PWC2017]

Getting Down to Business - 5​

On April 25th 2025, Manson took a flight to Jacksonville, Florida He had spoken to Khan a few times over the previous Six months. Khan was impressed by the Seaport plan and both Khan and Manson had talked about how AEW's relationship with NJPW would be after the closing of the transaction. Khan and Manson sat down in offices of the Jacksonville Jaguars and reminisced about those conversations they had about starting promotion all those years ago in Hong Kong. Khan admitted that he felt that AEW had struggled over the previous year and that he had hit a bit of a brick wall creatively. Manson was all business. He wanted to keep a decent working relationship with Khan and AEW but in the back of his mind knew that apart from one or two wrestlers in the AEW roster, the ones the had previously worked for NJPW he wasn't that impressed with where Khans promotion was in 2025 and felt that they were on opportunity to learn from.

Manson and Khan agreed that NJPW wrestlers would be able to work for AEW until January 2026 and that New World Pro-Wrestling would have first dibs on talent that Khan felt was surplus to requirements and vice versa. They agreed that the 'Forbidden Door' event in 2025 would be the last one and there would be no 'talent swapping' between the promotions from January 2026. Manson wasn't interested in partnerships. For him, New World Pro-Wrestling would be a universe in it's self and all under contract wrestlers would be within the profile required to be long term investments.

Manson returned to Las Vegas and got to work looking at what the roster would look like in January 2026. What both the NWA Governing Body and IWGP Governing Body would look like also. Manson wanted to have a rough idea of a breakdown of every weight class by the end of June 2025.

Living in South Las Vegas, Manson really enjoyed where his life was at this point. Playing soccer for a local amateur team on Sunday mornings and training most Wednesday evenings and just living a relatively normal life. Sometimes he missed life back in the UK but he had lived there for nearly 20 years. He had carved out new lives in both Hong Kong and now Las Vegas but felt like Vegas was going to be his forever home. He was now married, got his nice house and most of his wife's family were from the Las Vegas metro area.

The New World Pro-Wrestling HQ was downtown which was around a 35 min drive each day along the 1-15 Las Vegas Freeway. Manson would spend 4 days at the offices and a Wednesday either at home or try and fit in external meetings, breaking up the week.

Over May 2025, Manson and the team continued to get to work putting the initial rosters and weight classes together for the January 2026 start.

 

[PWC2017]

Getting Down to Business - 6 ​

Throughout May, Manson and Silkin met most days at New World HQ in Las Vegas to go over initial outline of what the NWA roster side of New World Pro-Wrestling would look like. The idea was a mix of NJPW gaijin, Previous and current Free Agents and members of other promotions that the team believed they would have a good chance of signing.

The initial list of the mens roster, first put together on the 10th May 2025 was seen below.

Heavyweight - 220lbs +	Middleweight - 190lbs - 220lbs	Lightweight - up to 190lbs	Super Heavyweight tag - 450lbs	Super Lightweight tag - Up to 450lbs
Oleg Boltin	Callum Newman	El Phantasmo	The Authors of Pain (Akam & Rezar)	MDK (Shane Haste & Mikey Nicholls)
Chase Owens	Drilla Moloney	Francesco Akira	Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows	Morris & Greene (Jack Morris & Anthony Greene)
David Finlay	Zach Sabre Jr	Robbie Eagles	The Coffey Brothers (Joe and Mark Coffey)
Gabe Kidd	Clark Connors	Cedric Alexander
Miro	Robert Bell	Colby Corino
Wolfgang	Fabian Aichner	Kerry Morton
Parker Boudreaux	Karl Fredericks	Sal Rinauro
Gable Steveson	El Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr.	Miguel 'Daga' Ángel
Donovan Dijak	Saxon Huxley	LJ Cleary
Mike Knox	Titus Alexander	Danny 'Limelight' Rivera
Royce Isaacs	Jorel Nelson
Oskar Leube

The wrestlers in light blue were already under contract with NJPW and had already been locked in. New Contracts had been sent out and the wrestlers had agreed terms and would be moving to the Nevada and California in January 2026.

The wrestlers in Purple had been released from promotions over the past 6 to 12 months and Manson and Silkin had put feelers out. Manson definitely wanted Miro and saw him as an initial NWA World Heavyweight Champion. Discussions had gone well with Miro and they were close to a deal.

The wrestlers in Red were free agents and offers had been made. Silkin believed Gable Steveson was a big player and someone who they could build around.

The wrestlers in Yellow were signed to other promotions but both Silkin and Manson believed they would be tempted to move should a solid offer be made.

Manson knew they needed to fill out the tag divisions and felt putting other wrestlers together from various 'Factions' would be the way forward.

Looking at the list, they both knew it lacked a level of star power, but they also accepted that the star power that would have been there had moved to AEW. Those names were most obviously Will Ospreay and even Kazuchika Okada. Manson had spoken to Silkin and advised he would go to Tony Khan and potentially put an offer in for the both of them later in the Summer.

They would continue to look at ways of adding to the roster throughout May and into early June 2025.

 

[PWC2017]

Getting Down to Business - 7​

The team, both in Las Vegas and in Tokyo had started having weekly meetings with Amazon Prime regarding what the weekly and monthly schedule would look like as well as the costing base for PPV Events.

Starting on the 5th January 2026, WrestleKingdom would be the first event on Amazon Prime PPV. The cost would be £19.99 GBP / $24.95 USD / Y4000 JPY. The costs were agreed by both Amazon and New World as a sensible fee that they believed would garner upwards of 80,000 to 100,000 buys. They hoped the PPV's based in the USA would bring in even more buys, with 150,000 to 250,000 buys discussed as a target for the group.

Meetings with Amazon also went through the types of venues New World Pro-Wrestling would be looking to run for events. Manson believed for the weekly events, venues with a capacity of up to 7/8,000 would be most suitable. Manson believed running events in the South and West of the USA would also be preferable to build a long term fanbase. Cities in California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Texas and Colorado would be the initial base for events with the major Cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Dallas, Salt Lake City, Austin and Denver seen as the best options for the big PPV events. Manson had already had conversations with MGM Resorts about housing a select number of PPV events in Las Vegas each year. A deal that could keep costs down in the long run and cement the organisation as a Las Vegas based group and as WrestleMania had proved, come to the destination city for a exciting weekend and take in a New World Pro-Wrestling event while your there. It made sense.

Ongoing discussions were going on daily with wrestlers as well as continuing to grow the backroom team, both within the office at the Las Vegas HQ as well as booker and trainer roles. Silkin had asked Arn Anderson to come on board and assist with booking meetings. Silkin had also asked Jim Cornette to join as an advisor to assist with setting up the tag and stables so that angles could be built organically through wrestlers signing deals with specific 'inter-promotional groups'.

By the end of May, the team had started to plan out the first month of TV and Events on the NWA side of things. Manson and Meji talked about the NWA World Heavyweight title been on the line at WrestleKingdom. Thom Latimer was the current champion so Manson wanted him in a match at the Tokyo Dome to kick off the new era. From there, the other weight divisions would then get going from the Tuesday onwards. Manson and the backroom events team provisionally arranged the dates and locations below as well as provisional names for the first 6 weeks of events.

Sunday - 4th January 2026 - WrestleKingdom - Tokyo Dome - Tokyo, Japan
Tuesday - 6th January 2026 - Battle on Prime - Walter Pyramid - Long Beach, CA, USA
Wednesday - 7th January 2026 - Fighting Spirit on Prime - Hiroshima Sun Plaza, Hiroshima, Japan
Thursday - 8th January 2026 - Thursday Night Fights - Amarillo Civic Center, Amarillo, TX, USA
Friday - 9th January 2026 - Strong Style Puroresu - Chiba Port Arena, Chiba, Japan
Tuesday - 13th January 2026 - Battle on Prime - Sames Auto Arena, Laredo, TX, USA
Wednesday - 14th January 2026 - Fighting Sprit on Prime - Morioka Takaya Arena, Morioka, Japan
Thursday - 15th January 2026 - Thursday Night Fights - Tingley Coliseum, Albuquerque, NM, USA
Friday - 16th January 2026 - Strong Style Puroresu - Kawasaki City Todoroki Arena - Kawasaki, Japan
Saturday - 17th January 2026 - The One - Michelob Ultra Arena - Las Vegas, NV, USA

Events in Gold are PPVs which will be on Prime PPV. The events in Red are the North American cards, which will be live 10pm (EST) live on Prime. The events in Blue are the Japanese / Far East shows. These will be live 9pm in Japan which will be around 8am (EST).

Most of the information was provisional but what Manson wanted to do was put an initial outline together for Amazon Prime to be able to agree to. Amazon were happy with the provisional outline and felt the content would be perfect for them in the long term.

Amazon had seen what Netflix were getting with WWE and felt a similar backing with the genuine alternative could be a real success. There was a genuine belief in the air that although the road would be long to get to 2026, when they got there they would have a real chance to succeed and carve out not just a space for themselves but cement themselves as a real player in the Pro-Wrestling Game.