AJ Styles feared his career could have been over after suffering an injury in his first match back in the WWE for months.
The former WWE Champion returned to the WWE on the October 4 episode of Smackdown to wrestle Carmelo Hayes. However, that match ended in disaster and it was stopped abruptly.
AJ Styles suffered an injury in the match that kept him out for four months. He wouldn’t return until the Royal Rumble match in February, although he was worried his career may have ended at that point.
Appearing on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, AJ Styles spoke about the injury he suffered back in October. The WWE star thought that this injury “might be it” and he didn’t know how he’d ever recover.
“I was like this is it. How am I going to recover again?” AJ Styles said. “I was like this might be it, and it sucked. Because like you said, I just came back. I was not hurt previously after I wrestled Cody in an “I Quit” match. I was not hurt during that time. So I’m sitting at home going okay, guys, okay. Then, hey, we’re going to bring you back in Nashville. It’s going to be great. Hurt myself, yeah I was p*ssed. I was mad. It may look like I was acting. I was not,” AJ Styles added.
AJ Styles On How The Injury Affects Him
Continuing, AJ Styles explains how the foot injury has impacted him. He said that he might limp more and feel more sore due to the injury, but he is always going full gear in his matches no matter what.
“I think it’s one of those things where I’m so afraid of losing a step I’m doing everything I can to make sure it doesn’t look like I’ve lost the step. But it took a toll on me. Because I go out there and I got two gears, all or nothing. Is that one gear? I don’t know.
“But the fact that, yeah, I’m gonna go in there and I’m gonna give it my all. And then after the adrenaline wears off, I was like, ‘Now it’s sore a little bit.’ So you might catch me limping afterwards until I get used to this foot, stretching it out, all those tendons and stuff like that. But so far so good.”
Despite feeling good in the latest run in his career, Styles admitted he has been thinking about when he’ll retire and has a timeframe in mind.
