Walking It Back: AJ Styles Will Never Be WWE Champion

Writer’s Note: Apology for the error last week. Duh, Brock Lesnar beat Kurt Angle at WrestleMania XIX. It wasn’t me not knowing, it was just a simple mistake. Apologies for the first ever mistake some of you have come upon, apparently, and may you rest easy.

This week, I wanted to keep the idea of me making a mistake fresh, as I wanted to focus on one of the bigger mistakes I’ve made as a wrestling fan. I know, especially in circles such as this, that it is usually fashionable to crow about the times we correctly predict something taking place, coming back later to remind everyone that you “called it.”

Hell, I have plenty of times that I “called it” that I love to still remind my friends about. Called The Rock beating John Cena at WrestleMania XVIII. Called Ricky Steamboat tearing the house down at WrestleMania XXV. Called Edge winning the Royal Rumble the second he was injured in the summer of 2009. Yeah, we all have our big moments where we were able to correctly guess what was to come, and it always makes us feel pretty good about ourselves.

When it’s the other way, though? You don’t usually see people come back to let you know that “Hey, I called this, but it actually didn’t happen. I was wrong.” I’m sure it does happen, but it’s not a common occurrence, and certainly not at the level of those wanting to remind everyone when they called something.

But I like to look back, and see how off base I was in certain situations, and have a good laugh at it. I did it a couple of years ago here, in fact, when I had to walk back my 2003 claim that Shawn Michaels wasn’t an all-time great. I know, can you believe that? But I did it, because it was the right thing to do, since his 2002-2010 stretch provided some of the greatest matches I’ve ever seen, and the dude is clearly one of the all-time greats.

The mistake I’d like to walk back today?

“AJ Styles will probably never go to WWE, and if he does, he’ll never hold a World Championship.”

I know how it comes off, and that’s fine. I clearly took a look at a great performer, one who had a lot of fans and hype, and decided to just be counterculture about it. I was always going to hate on this guy, and never give him the credit he deserved, no matter what he accomplished. Because, at the end of the day, and regardless of how good he was, I simply hated AJ Styles.

But, oddly enough, that wasn’t it. At least, not completely.

I never hated AJ Styles, let’s get that clear right off the bat. When I watched my first TNA episode in the summer of 2004, I had come in prepared. I had read about TNA for two years, studying up on the unfamiliar names. I read about AJ Styles, who seemed to be earmarked to be their star of the future. I had seen him wrestle a few times in the dying days of WCW, but he wasn’t someone that I had made a mental note to keep track of, so when WCW died, that was pretty much it for me and AJ Styles.

So when I saw him on TNA Impact, I was excited to see what this guy could bring to the table. And, to be sure, I thought that he was pretty incredible. However, he didn’t emerge as my favorite. That honor would go to both Christopher Daniels and Low Ki, instead.

Much like a Hart/HBK divide, I felt that Daniels and AJ were the two best in the company, and that I’d hitch my wagon to Daniels. Daniels, funny enough, was another guy who, in 1999, I had seen on Nitro after much hype and wasn’t impressed. Five years later, he would now become my favorite guy in TNA. Because I can absolutely admit when I’ve made a mistake, or when I’ve changed my mind.

Once I watched TNA, I was hooked. I loved the emphasis on athleticism. I loved the ridiculous moves. I loved seeing a different promotion with a full program devoted to wrestling. I’d soon add guys like Abyss, James Storm, Chris Harris, and more as people to keep an eye on. The whole time, AJ Styles was always at or near the top of the card. If he wasn’t X Champ, he was a World Champ. If he was neither of those, he probably grabbed a tag partner and was making a run for the Tag Titles. TNA always made sure that AJ Styles was positioned – and accepted – as a top level star.

And, at some point, I guess I just started to get tired of it. Much like my more recent complaints regarding Jeff Hardy’s superhuman abilities in the TNA/Impact world, I felt that AJ was simply given too much by the company, and it made me dislike him. I’d still enjoy his matches, but I’d also root for pretty much anyone to beat him, so he could have a cooling off period down the card. A cooling off period that, of course, never happened.

And so, probably somewhere around 2007 or 2008, I made the claim that I laid out above. While I was pretty sure he’d never go to WWE, I was willing to at least leave it open as a possibility. However, I KNEW that, even if he arrived, he’d never hold a World Title there. Whether it was a split brand show, or a unified roster, I just didn’t believe WWE would have that kind of faith in him, nor did I think he’d ever earn that type of respect from them, either.

Styles would continue to evolve in TNA, as he would break from his wrestling-focused character to portray a Ric Flair-lite heel, before eventually going into a darker, brooding persona that he would keep until leaving the company at the end of 2013. Along the way, he would introduce some new moves to his arsenal – namely his Calf Killer / Splitter – and looked to continue to his path towards becoming a complete wrestler.

Yet, even when he was done with TNA, I still held onto my claim. “Maybe they’ll give him a look, and get him on NXT. He still ain’t gonna hold the big belts.”

AJ would spend 2014 and 2015 with both Ring of Honor and New Japan, and it was during this stint that we would start hearing rumblings from fans paying attention to either product that Styles was dialed in. He was giving some of his best performances, and doing it with all sorts of competition from all over the world.

I took notice, but also brushed the praise aside, assuming it was just the usual AJ Styles freaks freaking out over the usual AJ Styles tricks, like they normally would. I assumed he hadn’t changed much (if at all), and it was more the thrill of seeing him take on the world’s best that was fueling this new round of hype. Still, it was hard to ignore the fact that New Japan had him as their IWGP Heavyweight Champion, a hell of an accomplishment in any era.

It wasn’t until a friend let me watch Wrestle Kingdom 9 that I realized that I may have misread the whole situation. Watching his match with Naito, I saw things from Styles that I hadn’t before. At least, not at that level. His heel work was fantastic. Being in The Bullet Club really seemed to pull something out of him, character wise, that we just never saw in TNA. On top of that, his in-ring stuff seemed to be a bit toned down as far as the super flippy-doo stuff is concerned, which was always just a personal thing, and not a valid general critique of the man. Still, I appreciated seeing what appeared to be a more mature AJ Styles doing his thing, and doing it extremely well.

It was at this point that I felt that Styles may never come to WWE, but not because of any decision they made. Instead, I felt Styles would be happy being the most successful indy wrestler on the planet, able to hop between America and Japan as desired, putting on great match after great match. Sure, my overall claim was still going to hold true, but the reasons for why, in my head at least, were now changing.

And then, after a few weeks of loud whispers, Styles would “shock” the world and debut at #3 of the 2016 Royal Rumble. And for the first few months of his run, WWE did exactly what I thought they would when it came to AJ Styles: they put him in “semi-main event” matches, before putting him in a purgatory feud with Chris Jericho.

The goal seemed simple enough: Jericho has good-great matches with nearly everyone, and would be an easy welcoming committee for AJ as he learned the WWE style of doing things. The problem was that Jericho, at the time, was a meandering babyface with no real goal, and no real spot for AJ to take. Wins for AJ were more like “Well yeah, he better be able to beat Jericho,” while his losses were freaked out over, as there was no reason for AJ to be losing to freaking Chris Jericho!

So, of course he lost to Jericho again, only this time at WrestleMania. From a white hot debut to losing to Chris Jericho at WrestleMania, it seemed AJ Styles had come crashing back down to earth. WWE had gotten what it needed out of him with some hot rumors and then people turning in to see his first appearances, but now that he was locked down, he could go on and fulfill his destiny of winning the US Title or something like that.

WWE had other plans. The night after WrestleMania, Styles would win a Fatal 4-Way (against Sami Zayn, Kevin Owens, and Chris Jericho) that gave him the position of #1 contender to Roman Reigns’ World Heavyweight Championship. I had a couple of my friends asking if I was nervous, but I wasn’t. I truly believed that AJ was only in this feud in WWE’s quest to make Roman Reigns look good. Beating AJ would make him look good. The feud was never about Styles.

Still, the fact remained that for two straight WWE Network Events That Used to Be PPVs, AJ Styles was in the main event, wrestling for the highest belt in the land. That, in and of itself, had to be considered an achievement, especially from the guy who never saw Styles getting this far.

Though he would lose the feud with Reigns, it appeared that the company had its #Woke moment with Styles. The scuttlebutt claimed that Styles was now being seen as a top level, main event-caliber guy after his series with Reigns. His smooth style worked perfectly with Roman, and AJ’s fans made sure to have their voices heard, displaying the outright popularity the man had. Styles would take the newfound confidence the company had in him and prove them right when he began to feud with John Cena.

Going into Money In The Bank, I was 100% certain that we were finally going to begin the AJ Styles descent back to higher mid-card status. I figured he’d have a great match with Cena, and that he’d either win with some shenanigans that Cena could immediately downplay, or that he would lose, and that would be that. And I wasn’t off, as Styles would win after some interference from The Club. It seemed pretty obvious now that WWE was preparing to stop the AJ Styles project (obvious to me, that is), and that all that was left was granting Cena his rematch, and then losing to Cena.

Instead, AJ Styles would beat Cena, clean as a sheet, in the middle of the ring, in a freaking fantastic match at SummerSlam 2016. When he beat Cena, I probably looked a little something like this:

Because I now knew, deep down, that it was only a matter of time. SummerSlam was when I knew I was wrong. But I had to hold on to my claim, because I was still technically correct. Styles had yet to win a title. Still, I knew that it was going to happen. You don’t defeat John Cena like that without any kind of reward.

Styles would be announced as the #1 contender to the now-WWE Title following the brand split over the summer, and that he would meet Dean Ambrose for the championship at Backlash. And, if you’re good at connecting the dots, or if you can remember all the way back to six months ago, you know what happened.

On that September night, AJ Styles threw a hearty “YOU DON’T KNOW SHIT!” my way when he defeated Dean Ambrose. It wasn’t that he had gone to WWE and succeeded. It wasn’t even that he did win a World Championship while in WWE. It was how he did it. How he became the best man in the company. He wasn’t given the “other” World Title like a Jack Swagger or a Big Show. He beat John Cena, and then beat Dean Ambrose, and the WWE Universe went crazy for his win.

It was, even for someone who’s been called an AJ Styles “hater” so many times (incorrectly, I might add), quite the amazing moment.

AJ Styles proved me wrong, and I enjoyed every second of every day of every year that I watched his path to that point. He is now one of my favorites to watch, and I fully appreciate what he brings to the table. It’s nice to see a wrestler throw you a curve and completely change how you thought about them. It’s even nicer to be an old fan, and still be excited when that change takes place.

Hats off to AJ Styles. You may not have heard, but he’s Phenomenal.

It’s All Wrestling. It’s All Silly. We All Love It.