page_title: Johnny Gargano
section_title: Dragon Gate USA and Evolve (2009–2016)
hierarchical_section_title: Johnny Gargano / Professional wrestling career / Dragon Gate USA and Evolve (2009–2016)
caption_attribution_description: English: Independent wrestler Johnny Gargano with the DGUSA Open the Freedom Gate Championship
context_page_description: Johnny Gargano is an American professional wrestler currently signed to WWE, where he performs on the NXT brand. He is a former NXT Champion, NXT North American Champion, and NXT Tag Team Champion.
  Gargano started his professional wrestling career in 2005, working for the Cleveland All–Pro Wrestling promotion. Over the following years, Gargano worked for some of the top promotions on the American independent circuit, including Chikara, Dragon Gate USA, Evolve and Pro Wrestling Guerrilla. Titles Gargano held include the Chikara Campeonatos de Parejas, the Evolve Tag Team Championship and DGUSA's Open the Freedom Gate Championship, which he held twice with his first reign lasting a record 873 days. During his independent days, Gargano also made appearances for national promotions Ring of Honor and Total Nonstop Action Wrestling.
  After making sporadic appearances for WWE early in his career, Gargano took part in the company's tryout camp in June 2015. Afterwards, he began appearing regularly for NXT, eventually signing a contract in April 2016. He formed a tag team, #DIY, with Tommaso Ciampa, and held the NXT Tag Team Championship once.
context_section_description: While wrestling for Chicago-based All American Wrestling (AAW), Gargano ran into Colt Cabana, who suggested he get in touch with former Ring of Honor booker Gabe Sapolsky, who was looking for talent for the Dragon Gate USA and Evolve Wrestling promotions, and tell him that Cabana sent him. Gargano received a tryout match for Dragon Gate USA on July 25, 2009, at the tapings of the Enter the Dragon pay-per-view, wrestling in an eight-way elimination dark match, which was won by Lince Dorado. On September 6 Gargano wrestled in another dark match at tapings of Untouchable, where he defeated Arik Cannon, Flip Kendrick, Hallowicked, Louis Lyndon, Prince Mustafa Ali, Shiima Xion and the Great Malaki in an eight-way elimination match. On November 28 at Freedom Fight, Gargano made his pay-per-view debut by entering the tournament to crown the first Open the Freedom Gate Champion, but was eliminated in the first round in a six-way match with Hallowicked, Lince Dorado, Matt Jackson, Nick Jackson and the winner of the match, Gran Akuma. On January 16, 2010, Gargano participated in Evolve Wrestling's first show, defeating Chris Dickinson in a singles match. Seven days later at Dragon Gate USA's fourth PPV, Fearless, Gargano wrestled in another dark match, losing to Kyle O'Reilly in a six-way match. In May 2010 Gargano signed a contract with Dragon Gate USA. On July 24, 2010, at Enter the Dragon 2010, Gargano wrestled his first singles match in Dragon Gate USA, losing to Cima, a founding father of Dragon Gate, the parent company of Dragon Gate USA. At the following event on September 25, Gargano was defeated by Chuck Taylor in a four-way match, which also included Drake Younger and Rich Swann. The following day Gargano offered himself to Cima's Warriors International stable, before defeating Drake Younger in a singles match. On October 29 at Dragon Gate USA's first live pay-per-view, Bushido: Code of the Warrior, Gargano wrestled in a four-way match, which was won by Chuck Taylor and also included Arik Cannon and Ricochet. After Taylor turned down an offer from Cima to join his Warriors International stable, Gargano offered himself to Cima, but was turned down. Gargano confronted Cima again after his match, offering himself to Warriors International, before attacking him and his stablemate Ricochet, along with Chuck Taylor and Rich Swann. The three  formed their own stable called Ronin. At the following day's tapings of Freedom Fight 2010, Ronin defeated Austin Aries, Genki Horiguchi and Ricochet in a six-man tag team match.
  On January 29, 2011, Gargano and Taylor entered a three-day-long tournament to determine the first ever Open the United Gate Champions. In their first tournament match, Gargano and Taylor defeated Blood Warriors representatives Naruki Doi and Ricochet and followed that up by defeating another Blood Warriors team of Cima and Dragon Kid the following day. On January 30 Gargano and Taylor were defeated in the finals of the tournament by World–1 representatives Masato Yoshino and PAC. On April 1 at Open the Southern Gate, Gargano had a rematch with Cima, with Ronin now working as a babyface group against Cima's Blood Warriors, but was defeated just like in the previous singles match between the two. The following day at the Mercury Rising 2011 pay-per-view, Ronin was defeated in the main event six-man tag team match by the Blood Warriors team of Cima, Naruki Doi and Ricochet. On April 3 at Open the Ultimate Gate, Austin Aries, who had just lost a match, where he had put his Dragon Gate USA career on the line, feigned passing the torch to his former rivals in Ronin, but instead ended up turning on them and joining Blood Warriors. After picking up Evolve wins over Ricochet, Frightmare, and Jimmy Jacobs, Gargano defeated Jon Davis on April 19 at Evolve's first live internet pay-per-view. Later that same night, he defeated Chuck Taylor in a tiebreaker match to become Evolve's new wins leader with a record of 6–2. On June 3 at Dragon Gate USA's Fearless 2011, Gargano faced Aries in a losing effort, but came back two days l
caption: Gargano with the Open the Freedom Gate Championship belt in January 2013
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