Former Bullet Club member and current member of The O.C. Karl Anderson recently spoke with Busted Open Radio about how the debut of Tama Tonga this past Friday on SmackDown came to be.

Anderson recently went back to Japan in 2023 to compete for New Japan Pro Wrestling due to him still being the NEVER Openweight Champion at the time of resigning with WWE.

Luke Gallows and Anderson’s contracts with TNA had expired in 2022 which is the same year he won the championship. They would go on to resign with WWE in October.

Anderson would then go on to lose the championship to Tama Tonga at the Wrestle Kingdom 17 event in January of last year. This would mark Anderson being the first ever contracted WWE superstar to compete at the event thanks in part to Paul “Triple H” Levesque.

As sated earlier Anderson recently spoke with Busted Open and revealed that it was a text from him to Triple H that started the process of Tama Tong signing with WWE

“After my Tokyo Dome match in 2023, which Triple H let me do. I re-signed with WWE, and I was still a champion in New Japan, and he still allowed me to go back and do two matches with New Japan Pro-Wrestling with no issue at all, but I remember texting Triple H and telling him, ‘Tama Tonga’s contract’s coming up. I think Tama’s a full-blown, a can’t-miss, if you ask me.’ He wrote back right away, and it took a year to get it done, but now he’s here.”

You can check out his full interview below:

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