As noted before, AJ Styles’ legendary WWE career came to a heartbreaking end at the 2026 Royal Rumble in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, as The Phenomenal One tapped out to Gunther in a retirement stipulation match, The loss means Styles must officially retire from WWE competition, per the terms of the match.
Speaking during the Royal Rumble post-show, WWE Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque spoke about Styles and his career.
“You know, it’s a funny thing that in this business, there are very few people that are universally loved, that are universally respected, right? That no matter the wars they’ve had with other people, no matter the battles that they’ve had in this business, all of that is aside. Almost no one ever has a bad word to say about AJ Styles. It’s a testament to the human being that he is. When you look at his career, it’s easy to say, just in the decade that he was here in WWE alone, how big of a career, how impactful of a career. But he’s one of those people, I feel like his influence on this business will be Shawn Michaels-esque. There will be somebody 10 years from now, there will be a lot of people 10 years from now that when you talk about what got you into this business, they will say AJ Styles. When you say, what influenced your career? AJ Styles. Who do you pattern yourself after? AJ Styles. He has that level of respect and sort of impact on the business. It’s hard to measure.”
Asked about future roles in WWE for Styles, Triple H said,
“We’ve had a lot of conversations on the off-chance when this all came down. Obviously, we expected it later in the year. We had a lot of conversations about it. AJ is one of those people that absolutely wants to give back and be a part of this business. I don’t wanna’ speak for him, but the conversations that he had with me, he made it very clear that he was just done with the in-ring. There’s a point when you just reach in your career where you say, I don’t want to do this anymore, and when your heart goes, no matter how good you are — he hasn’t lost a step, at anything — but when you just say, I’m just at a place when I don’t wanna do this anymore, it’s time. Before you get hurt, before you get told you’re not allowed to do this anymore. I think he was there. I’m hoping that he will contribute, because again, he’s one of the most influential people in the business and one of the greatest minds in the business and I think when you see somebody like what Shawn Michaels is doing in NXT, I think that’s a path and a career for AJ Styles, beyond this period that he’s in.”
