WWE Hall of Famer set to be in attendance for the Owen Hart Foundation Tournament Final
The finals of the 2023 Owen Hart Foundation Tournament will take place this weekend on the July 15 edition of AEW Collision, and a WWE Hall of Famer looks set to make an appearance.
The Hall of Famer in question is NJPW legend Jushin Liger, who may have one match on WWE television during his career (against Tyler Breeze in 2015). However, he is regarded as arguably the most influential junior heavyweight performer of all time.
And it seems that he will be making his AEW debut this weekend as he tweeted a picture of a waiting board at Haneda Airport in Japan, where he announced that he would be traveling to Calgary for this weekend's edition of Collision.
#カナダ・カルガリー
いま羽田空港です。これからサンフランシスコ経由でカナダ・カルガリーまで行ってきます。オーエン・ハート選手のメモリアルトーナメントのゲストに呼ばれました☆久しぶりのカルガリー、楽しみです❤ #カナダ・カルガリー https://t.co/hWpX9FTSpr
"I am at Haneda Airport now. From now on, I will go to Calgary, Canada via San Francisco. I was invited as a guest at Owen Hart's memorial tournament ☆ I'm looking forward to Calgary after a long time," tweeted @Liger_NJPW.
The appearance looks to have been in the pipeline for a while, as AEW president Tony Khan stated in an interview back in May 2023 that it would be cool to bring Jushin Liger to Canada for the tournament, despite the WWE Hall of Famer being firmly retired.
Liger retired at the NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 14 event in January 2020, with his last official match being a tag team loss alongside his long-time rival Naoki Sano. They were defeated by the team of Hiromu Takahashi and current NXT star Dragon Lee.
Jushin Liger is someone who knew all about Owen Hart
Some people may be wondering why Jushin Liger is attending the finals of the Owen Hart Foundation Tournament. Well, to put it simply, Owen and the Hart family were an important part of Liger's early career.
Under his real name Keiichi Yamada, Liger went on an excursion to Stampede Wrestling in 1987 which was the promotion owned and run by Stu Hart. It was here where he first crossed paths with a young Owen Hart, with the two wrestling as a tag team for a short period of time.
Owen Hart vs Jushin Liger (1991)
That DDT at the end was brutal https://t.co/oRaZQQ34k0
After the excursion finished, Owen would travel in the opposite direction and begin appearing for New Japan Pro Wrestling in late 1987, where he would cross paths with Yamada before and after he became the legendary Jushin Liger character.
The final match they had together took place in the second-annual Top of the Super Juniors tournament, where Liger defeated Owen in what was widely regarded as one of the best matches of 1991, and the best match the two men had against each other.
Are you excited to see Jushin Liger on AEW Collision? Let us know in the comments section down below!