AJ Styles On His Retirement From Wrestling

[00:00:00]So, how's retirement treating you?

[00:00:01]>> Oh, wow. You know, it's funny cuz I think I'm gone a little bit more than I was when I was actually working.

[00:00:06]>> Really?

[00:00:07]>> Yeah, I don't I don't know how that works, but the getting the chance to go down to the performance center and work with those uh men and women down there, it's it's pretty awesome. It scratches that itch, you know, um and being involved with Evolve uh is is awesome. I've I've produced a couple matches, which I didn't think I'd enjoy, but I love it. You know, and I I I've heard this is how it all starts is that yeah, you you start producing and the next thing you know, you're getting heavily involved with certain kind of things, but it's really cool to see uh working with uh the the young talent and the light bulb going off and I go, "Oh, oh, wow."

[00:00:44]And I'm trying to give my moves away.

[00:00:45]I'm like, "Hey, try this, try this, try this, try this. I'm not going to use it anymore, you know." Kind of thing. I'm having fun.

[00:00:50]>> How long had you been thinking about hanging them up and retiring?

[00:00:54]>> Well, um I was going to retire before the Royal Rumble at WrestleMania, the pre But, I'd just come back from my foot injury and just didn't seem right. Like, I was feeling kind of good actually once I got my foot back in order.

[00:01:12]Um I was like, "Man, and and there was some kind of like, man, I don't know. I don't know." And I'm sure money was a thing because I didn't ask for more money. I just wanted to extend it.

[00:01:21]Uh but then again, they they did right by me and and, you know, paying me well. And so, I know that wasn't an issue, but then we finally got that in order and I was like, "All right, here we go." And I'm not saying I didn't get weird near the end of knowing I was going to retire or leave WWE. I got weird, dude.

[00:01:41]>> In what way?

[00:01:42]>> I just was questioning everything. Like, everything I was questioning it. Like, a normal saying AJ Styles would not question this. It would just be what it is, you know? And even the the moment where I found out Gunther was in the Royal Rumble. And I think that it had already been explained that he was in the Royal Rumble and that I got this match, but you know, it I was like, what the freak? And I probably made I think I made Triple H feel awful about oh man, I didn't think about that. When the reality is, nobody thought about that. Nobody did. Nobody cared. Even when Gunther came out at the Royal Rumble and and got beat, you know, in in fact, it should have made more sense that he got beat because he was in the ring with AJ Styles. He got exhausted in that match. Of course he's not going to win the Royal Rumble. And so I just got weird, man. So my apologies to everyone who I acted that way and I was just in a weird state of mind.

[00:02:36]>> When you say you're questioning things, you questioning whether it was the right decision to retire?

[00:02:41]>> Well, there was that going on. I mean, is this it? This is what I do? Like uh there were rumors of things. I never really talked to anybody from anywhere else. It just it was there.

[00:02:56]Um it's difficult because this is all I've ever known as far as like I've invested my life into this career and I I think the only way you get to this point where um you've reached the heights is you have to be obsessed with it and I was. And so I dedicated nothing else as far as work goes but to pro wrestling. So I didn't know anything. I'm I'm I can't fix anything.

[00:03:28]Like I'm the worst.

[00:03:30]In fact, I end up breaking stuff. So it's just when that's all you know and you don't know what else to do and what is life after it's very confusing and and emotional. It's it's a lot of different things that I really can't put my finger on, but I know you get weird.

[00:03:49]>> So when we sat down a little over a year ago, you said you would not wrestle into your 50s. So, you were already starting to think about retirement.

[00:03:56]>> How did you know it was time to end?

[00:03:59]>> There >> Cuz you you don't look like you slowed down at all.

[00:04:02]>> Well, it it is the the thought of me not being able to be AJ Styles.

[00:04:09]To throw that 450 in against Gunther one last time to say I can still do this.

[00:04:16]I just don't have to anymore.

[00:04:18]You know, it was me saying, you know, all right.

[00:04:22]I I I am older, but I can I can still go.

[00:04:26]But, that's not the reason to stay in it.

[00:04:28]You know, at some point you will embarrass yourself >> [snorts] >> if you stay in it long enough.

[00:04:33]You will embarrass yourself cuz people will say, "Wow, that's not the AJ Styles I used to know. Man, that's really bad."

[00:04:39]Uh and I and I preface this by saying a lot of people, "Well, he slowed down, you know, he did. He wasn't doing what he was doing in TNA." Wrong.

[00:04:46]I just actually learned psychology, you know, and I'm not saying that I was a doofus in TNA, but when psychology comes into play matches are a lot better with doing less.

[00:04:57]You know, so I'm I it's just Man, I I'm thankful for the career I've had.

[00:05:06]And I would I at that point, at 48 years old I made the right decision.

[00:05:11]>> Do you miss it?

[00:05:14]>> I don't miss falling down.

[00:05:17]I don't miss getting you know, hurt. I don't miss any of that, but there's you're always going to miss that part of the excitement that you're about to go to the ring and have a great match.

[00:05:29]Like I you're going to miss that. That's just the high you don't get from anything else.

[00:05:32]Um but again, I get to go down to the Performance Center and scratch that itch and just throw myself into helping these performers down at the PC get better.

[00:05:43]And, you know, I'm sure we'll We'll about this and and I get to pour into my son as well.

[00:05:47]>> I think when you said that you were going to have your final match in 2026, nobody expected it to be in January of 2026.

[00:05:54]Why not push it to WrestleMania? Why not have your last match at WrestleMania this year?

[00:05:59]>> That that wasn't my pay-per-view or PLE.

[00:06:01]That's not where I started. For me to be able to debut and then end it at the Royal Rumble, and I don't care that it was in Saudi Arabia, it's still the Royal Rumble.

[00:06:14]It that meant something to me. That was saying that, you know, I I know there's people who have WrestleMania as their big that's their big PLE, but mine was the Royal Rumble.

[00:06:24]>> And it's like this perfect decade, right?

[00:06:27]>> [snorts] >> 10 years, exactly.

[00:06:28]>> Yep.

[00:06:28]>> Royal Rumble to Royal Rumble.

[00:06:31]>> Yeah, I mean it just seemed like it was made to be that way. Like at 10 years, like I did it, you know, probably wasn't supposed to go that long, you know, but found a way to get there.

[00:06:44]>> I think it was a good ending.

[00:06:45]How did you get to Gunther being your final opponent?

[00:06:48]>> That wasn't up to me. It was up to the story. And he had retired Goldberg, he retired John Cena.

[00:06:55]Why not retire AJ Styles?

[00:06:56]>> How much thought did you put into what that finish would look like? Because a month earlier, John Cena went out the same way, but John Cena tapped. You get the sleeper hold put on you, you pass out.

[00:07:08]>> Yeah, but I think the whole thing with our match was that I made him tap out, but you weren't going to make me tap out kind of deal, and I didn't.

[00:07:16]>> Mhm.

[00:07:16]>> I went out on my shield, and you know, I almost almost had the ropes, but there there was the moment there that AJ Styles couldn't hold out any longer.

[00:07:25]His body had given up on him.

[00:07:28]His air supply was gone.

[00:07:31]Passes out.