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When AJ Styles unseated Jinder Mahal for the WWE Championship last fall, it felt like a revelation. After a half year of Mahal by and large cutting OK to actively bad promos, and never putting on a better than passable match, it was a relief for the strap to go to arguably the most complete wrestler on the WWE roster, and particularly SmackDown’s best in ring worker.
Nearly a year has gone by now, and Styles continues his reign. He survived a rematch with Mahal, the threat of Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn, Rusev, a lengthy program with Shinsuke Nakamura, and, thus far, Samoa Joe. The question now becomes, when does Styles drop the title?
A number of critics are calling the Styles reign stale at this point, and particularly so since WWE started combining rosters for PPVs again, Styles hasn’t sniffed the main event, in favor of the Universal Championship, the Intercontinental Championship, or whatever match Roman Reigns is having closing shows. Just the same, is there really a better option than Styles?
This article looks at why it is or is not time for AJ Styles to drop the title in a point-counterpoint format.
#5 Point: This reign is feeling stale
Some of the longest, most successful WWE Championship reigns in history ran far longer than AJ Styles’s has up to this point. However, guys like Hulk Hogan and Bruno Sammartino were very different kinds of wrestlers, operating in very different eras.
Styles is a fighting champion who appears on TV every week, during an era with more WWE programming than ever before. It’s understandable that fans’ patience and attention spans run shorter nowadays and it’s not his fault, but ten months now feels a lot like multiple years did back in the day. WWE could turn things around with some really electric storytelling, or a series of matches that fully take advantage of Styles' remarkable talents.
The reign feels stalled out at this point, though, just waiting for a champion WWE is more invested in to take the title off of The Phenomenal One.
#4 Counterpoint: No one will give the title better matches than Styles
Who is the best in ring worker under contract to WWE today? I don’t know that there’s a consensus answer, but there is a pretty short list. From Raw, guys like Seth Rollins or maybe Dolph Ziggler could enter the conversation. From NXT, one could argue on behalf of Johnny Gargano or Tomasso Ciampa. And from SmackDown? Daniel Bryan surely has his supporters, and Samoa Joe is up there. At the end of the day, though, it’s hard to say that anyone can quite match the big match expertise, intensity, agility, and technical acumen of AJ Styles.
While Styles has run through a lot of his top opponents already in this reign, if you’re looking to guarantee a three star or better world title match for every PPV, it’s hard to make any safer bet than keeping the WWE Championship around the waist of The Phenomenal One.
#3 Point: It’s time for the WWE Championship to main event again
At WrestleMania 34, AJ Styles was booked for a purist’s dream match against Shinsuke Nakamura. These two had torn the house down in New Japan years before and there was every reason to believe that they’d do so again in front of a stadium crowd for WWE.
They didn’t get the main event nod, though, despite competing for the WWE Championship. That honor went to Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns.
To be fair, out of a middling story and working a tepid face vs. face encounter to set up Nakamura’s heel turn, this match didn’t exactly set the world on fire. Just the same, that the match occurred third from the top was emblematic of how WWE management seems to see Styles and his title reign. He’s good enough to maintain as champ, but there’s just not enough long term vision for him carrying the company to properly get behind him and let him close out PPVs. It’s high time we get back to a situation in which the WWE Champion is a star the company treats as a similar or greater draw to the Universal Champion.
#2 Counterpoint: We haven’t seen a proper Styles vs. Bryan showdown yet
AJ Styles has fended off a variety of challengers under a variety of circumstances over the past ten months. To be fair, that does include a match with Daniel Bryan two nights after WrestleMania. While the bout was good and well worked, it was also quite consciously a TV match with no story behind it, largely set up for Shinsuke Nakamura to disrupt the proceedings.
While it’s unfortunate that that might be as much of a Styles vs. Bryan match as we get, that’s not a totally foregone conclusion. If the Styles reign stretches on, and particularly with so many PPVs and international shows on the calendar, it’s not out of the question at all that we could get another Styles-Bryan match that would afford these guys a solid twenty minutes-plus to work their magic and arrive at a real finish. That possibility is enough to make any hardcore fan want to see Styles carry on as champ a little longer.
Conclusion: It’s time
AJ Styles is truly world class performer, and I hope this isn’t the last time he’s in a world title picture in WWE. However, his current reign feels stale, and his program with Samoa Joe offers an outstanding opportunity for The Phenomenal One to pass the torch to another hard working talent who can continue to do the title justice bell-to-bell with great matches in the ring.
If Styles carries the title into the winter, the odds are he’ll be dropping it to The Miz or Randy Orton. Miz could be fun for adding title stakes to the blow off his feud with Daniel Bryan (perhaps at WrestleMania 35) and yet the idea of The Miz holding the WWE Championship still doesn’t feel quite right after his original flop reign. Orton is the even less savory option. As much as he’s looked motivated since his latest turn, he’s permanently stale in a world champion’s role and hopefully won’t suck the WWE Championship down into yet another blah chapter.
