AJ Styles Reflects On Why NIL Women Pick Up Pro Wrestling Quicker Than NIL Men

AJ Styles has a theory for why women in the WWE NIL program tend to pick up wrestling quicker than their male counterparts. The divide between the men and women in NXT has been a talking point for a while and gained new focus when Grayson Waller called it out in a promo on the brand. Waller’s comments spurred a number of conversations about the men’s and women’s division among pro wrestlers and fans alike.

Styles weighed in on the matter in a fashion during the latest episode of The AJ Styles Show. When talking about WWE’s homegrown talent, he noted that the NIL program has created more homegrown stars among the women then the men, as female athletes coming in pick it up a bit quicker. He noted that it is, in his perception, the opposite with talent coming from the Independent scene. You can see highlights from his comments below:

On NIL Women Picking It Up Quicker Than Men:

“Well, I think you’re going to find homegrown more of the women’s side than you are on the male side. I think that’s the way it is here. From my experience, and I’m not trying to — listen, I am biased when it comes to the independents. I know what it’s like to be there and bust your tail just to get noticed. And so, I am very biased, and I think they are a lot better than they’re perceived sometimes.

“But the women, when it comes to homegrown talent who come straight from college, from athletics to the wrestling world, they seem to get it a little quicker than the males that come from the college background, the Next In Line, I think the women seem to get it faster.”

On the Situation Being Different With Independent Talent:

“But it’s quite the opposite in the independents The guys seem to get it a lot quicker on the independents. I don’t know why that is, I’ve tried to figure this out myself. I don’t know if it’s an ego thing where — in the independents, we know what wrestling looks like because we’ve watched it our whole lives. We’ve enjoyed it, we want it to be like this. And we’ve got an idea of how we sell and what it looks like, where the athlete has dedicated their life to that position. Where you know, they’ve played that sport in college then, or high school and then went to college. So that’s all they know.

“And to be that good, to be a D1 athlete… it takes an ego. So that ego is still in their system by the time they get to WWE, and we have to find a way to get that out as quickly as possible. Even I wrestled in college. And to a point, I was like, ‘Man, I’m a wrestler. I don’t know about that freaking entertainment stuff.’ Even I had to figure that out. I think that’s what slows the guys down in that process. I could be wrong; maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about at all. I’m just trying to put two and two together.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit The AJ Styles Show with a h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.