AJ Styles made Triple H feel awful due to major WWE booking decision

AJ Styles made Triple H feel awful due to a major booking decision. The 49-year-old star retired from in-ring competition earlier this year after a decade with WWE.

He faced Gunther at the Royal Rumble and put his career on the line. The defeat to the Ring General brought an end to his decorated career. During his tenure with WWE, Styles has usually gone with the creative direction with minimum fuss, but he had his doubts about a booking decision at the Royal Rumble.

After Gunther beat Styles, he entered at No. 30 to compete in the Royal Rumble match. He sold the effects of the match with The Phenomenal One and was eliminated at the end by Roman Reigns.

Speaking on INSIGHT with Chris Van Vliet, Styles said leading up to his retirement match, he was questioning everything and didn’t understand why Gunther was put in the Rumble match after beating him earlier in the night.

The former WWE Champion said he questioned Triple H‘s decision and admitted that he made the Chief Content Officer feel awful about it.

“I just was questioning everything. A normal, sane AJ Styles would not question this; it would just be what it is. Even 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 I was like, what the freak? I think I made Triple H feel awful about it. Oh man, I didn’t think about that,” he said.

AJ Styles said it wasn’t a big deal, as it made sense that Gunther would lose in the match. He said his behavior was weird and apologized for his actions.

“When reality is, nobody thought about that; nobody did, nobody cared, even when Gunther came out at the Royal Rumble and got beat. 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. 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,” he added.

AJ Styles reveals his biggest fear during WWE run

After his debut in the 2016 Royal Rumble match, AJ Styles had a decorated run in WWE. He won the WWE Championship twice and also held the United States, Intercontinental, and tag team championships at various points.

Despite this, he had the fear of losing his job in the company at any point. Speaking on one of the episodes of his Phenomenally Retro Podcast, he said his biggest fear was that he would be released by the promotion.

He mentioned it may surprise fans given his status, but he doesn’t see himself the way fans do.