When news broke that Andrade El Idolo, Rush, and the Lucha Brothers were unable to perform at AEW‘s Forbidden Door due to tensions between AAA and NJPW, it put a minor damper on what is expected to be one of the most entertaining cross-promotional events, nay, Pay-Per-Views of the year.

Gone were the Los Ingobernables reunion dream matches many a fan fantasy booked for the show, including this particular one involving Suzuki-Gun, and the G.O.D-Lucha Brothers match that, at least according to Cagematch, has never happened, and instead, folks have had to turn their attention to the portion of the card that has already been announced, with only the occasional “What-ifs” of what could have been.

Well, guess what? While fans may never fully know what Tony Khan and Gedo had planned for the Mexican members of the AEW roster who are contracted to AAA, Andrade swooped in and delivered a very tasty nugget of information dipped in a full packet of sweet and sour sauce: Will Ospreay was his scheduled opponent for Forbidden Door.

… what? OC wasn't TK's first choice for Ospreay at Forbidden Door? Goodness, this is an interesting development indeed.

Andrade El Idolo would have scored a money match at AEW's Forbidden Door.

Speaking with Hugo Savinovich of Lucha Libre Online in an interview translated by Luis Pulido, Andrade described that the original idea for Forbidden Door was to have the occasionally masked luchador face off against Will Ospreay for the IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship, first (presumably) in a post-match angle after NJPW's Dominion show, which is where he initially won the belt after it was vacated by Juice Robinson, and then on AEW television much like the current storyline with Orange Cassidy and the greater Best Friends/CHAOS stable.

Granted, Andrade didn't explicitly mention whether his match would feature additional performers or if his fellow Los Ingobernables members would work their way into the angle in the same way that FTR have with Best Friends members Trent Berretta and Orange Cassidy, but he did explicitly mention Rush later in the same thought, leaving speculation to ensue over what could have been.

… but what could have been? Unsurprisingly enough, Andrade hasn't faced Ospreay yet in his career, as he was already in the WWE system when the eventual United Empire member came to prominence in the promotion. Though Andrade has performed 82 matches in NJPW both as a solo performer and in teams, he hasn't been in a Lion-logo'd ring since 2015, when he took down Mascara Dorada in Korakuen Hall in Tokyo. Post-his excursion in Japan, Andrade, as La Sombra, worked heavily in CMLL, where he continued to work with and occasionally against his Los Ingobernables faction mates while recording a 953-day title run as the NWA World Historic Middleweight Championship, which, unsurprisingly, is one of the longest title reigns in wrestling history.

While some may have forgotten about the La Sombra run in CMLL or just weren't around to witness it for one reason or another, Andrade's run was widely considered one of the better in the promotion's history, and even though he opted to take his talents to AAA instead when he was released from WWE, his roots in NJPW are incredibly deep – much deeper than Ospreay's current opponent, who has only wrestled Japan 10 times over his career exclusively as Fire Ant from his Chikara run.

Will the match between Orange Cassidy and Will Ospreay still be a fantastic battle of competing styles? You bet; some might even call it a sleeper hit for the match of the card, but while the leader of the United Empire is being kicked by a pockets-handed man, it'll be hard not to imagine what the match would look like if it was Andrade, not OC, in the ring instead, especially of Los Ingobernables fail to make their presence known on the show.