A former WWE United States Champion, Kalisto was released by the promotion on 15th April after spending 8 years with the company. Days after parting ways with WWE, the Mexican-American pro wrestler took to Twitter to tease his boxing debut.

Kalisto to go back to his old name for boxing debut

On Wednesday, Kalisto tweeted a cryptic post that includes a short, five-second clip of himself donning the gloves, which also referred to him as “Samuray Del Sol”, the name he used before joining WWE, with the video ending with the text “Coming soon”.

Along with the clip, he used the Triller hashtag in his tweet, which highly suggests that the 34-year-old boxing career will kick off with the combat sports company which partnered with famous American rapping icon Snoop Dogg, has gained a massive fan following after marking some big achievements in the boxing fraternity.

Back in November last year, Triller became the media partner for the highly anticipated exhibition bout between Mike Tyson and Roy Jones Jr that took place at the Staples Center which also featured Jake Paul vs Nate Robinson in the undercard.

Just on their inaugural event, Triller surpassed UFC 251 as the most-bought combat sports PPV of 2020, with an astronomical 1.6 million buys in total. The company also promoted the recent boxing match between Jake Paul and Ben Askren and has also won the bid for the upcoming Teófimo López vs George Kambosos Jr on 6th June.

After spending nine years in the independent circuit with appearances in AAW and Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide and various other promotions, Kalisto joined WWE in May 2013 after signing a developmental contract.

Under his new ring name, Kalisto made his NXT debut against Baron Corbin at a live event in September, followed by his first television appearance with his new tag team partner El Local, defeating the Legionnaires (Marcus Louis and Sylvester Lefort) in May 2014.

Kalisto gradually teamed up with Sin Cara to form “The Lucha Dragons” and became the NXT Tag Team Champions. He made his Raw debut in March 2015 alongside Cara and in the same year, defeated Alberto Del Rio to become the United States Champion. After losing the title to Del Rio, Kalisto wound regain it for the second time in their rematch at Royal Rumble.

In October 2017, Kalisto defeated Enzo Amore in a Raw main event lumberjack match to become the new WWE Cruiserweight Champion but lost the title in the rematch in the same month at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs. Before his release from WWE, Kalisto was part of a trio called “Lucha House Party” featuring Gran Metalik and Lince Dorado.

Although Teófimo López is promoted by Top Rank, Ryan Kavanaugh’s Triller won the IBF purse bid on Thursday, which was conducted at the IBF headquarters in Springfield, New Jersey over an online conference call.

The Triller CEO submitted the winning bid at an astronomical $6,180,000, outbidding both Top Rank ($2,315,000) as well as Matchroom Boxing ($3,506,000) who were aiming to bring the bout to ESPN and DAZN respectively.

Teófimo López-George Kambosos Jr: Ryan Kavanaugh aims to “bring entertainment to a purist sport”

Soon after winning the bid, Ryan Kavanaugh revealed that he’s aiming to host López vs Kambosos sometime around in May this year on Triller pay-per-view.

“This fight was a really important one for us to have. Having the undisputed lightweight champion on Triller was something we were really hoping to get,” Kavanaugh told BoxingScene, “We are very excited. It’s the next step for us in trying to pair all quadrants of our entertainment together with true boxing.” 

The $6 million purse bid will be split 65-35 in Lopez’s favor as per IBF’s rules, which will earn the undefeated lightweight superstar and his team their career-highest $3,911,700 (20% cut goes to Top Rank), while the mandatory contender Kambosos and his comrades will pocket $2,106,300, another career-highest.

ALSO READ: Teófimo López unhappy at Top Rank, threatens to walk out like Mayweather

Having promoted the Mike Tyson versus Roy Jones Jr. exhibition match back in November as their first fight, Triller has also announced another exhibition sparring contest between Jake Paul and MMA star Ben Askren on 17th April.

However, the López vs Kambosos card will be their first professional boxing event, but Kavanaugh wants to make it clear that they are here as a friend, not competitors to Top Rank or any other established promotion.

“We’re hopefully showing people that we’re here as a friend to the boxing world to bring them the fights they want to see,” the Triller chief went on, “We’re here not to attack it, but to bring entertainment to what has traditionally been a purist sport.“

Speaking of Bob Arum, Kavanaugh insisted that the Top Rank CEO’s true challenger is Matchroom MD Eddie Hearn.

“We are in no way competing with Bob Arum. Eddie Hearn is Arum’s true competition. We’re just doing it to build a brand,” he added.