Triple H Confirms AJ Styles' Interest In A WrestleMania Match
Paul "Triple H" Levesque conducted a media call ahead of NXT "TakeOver: Stand And Deliver". Triple H was asked if it was true that AJ Styles has been pestering him for a WrestleMania match. Styles has said in the past that Triple H was a dream opponent for him in WWE.
"He pestered me with it every time I saw him. He would ask me about it and asked me about my schedule," Triple H revealed. "I've said it before, getting ready WrestleMania is a different ting, and the older you get, the harder it gets. Doing this once a year, once every couple of years, especially now, is not an easy task. You try to stay in the best shape you can, but that's not WrestleMania shape, and it's a different thing. So when he very first came to me, I said, Man, I'm not going to tell you. To be honest with you, personally, I'd love to work with you. At this point, you can carry me to something.' I'd love it, and so the personal side of it, the athlete side of it to the performer side of it would love nothing more.
"The reality of it is, I am not going to have the bandwidth or the availability schedule-wise to be able to pull that off, and then he would come to me every week or every other week whenever I would see him and say, 'How's that bandwidth coming? You gonna be able to make this happen?' And I would say, 'It's not gonna happen.' I'm flattered by that. I really am. I'm humbled by it, but I wish I had the bandwidth to do it, and I'm not saying I won't do it in the coming year if it's right and everybody believes that it's what should be done. I'm at a point where to me, the in-ring stuff is bonus.
"It's funny [Ric] Flair calls me all the time to tell me, 'You got to get back in the ring. You got to go to WrestleMania. You have to have that closure. You have to do this, whatever, retirement match.' There's a part of me that wants to do it, and there's just a part of me, and it's a bigger part right now that goes, man, I am so busy 24/7 that to even try to contemplate even train the way I would want to train and get in shape. And by in shape, I don't mean look, I mean in shape ring-wise so you don't embarrass yourself when you get in there at 52. It's a lot of work. I'm not afraid of the work. If I could make more hours in the day, I could find time to do it. It's just the time."
Styles will challenge for the RAW Tag Team Titles at WrestleMania 37 alongside Omos. Triple H gave a preview on what fans can expect to see in Omos' in-ring debut.
He's a sponge. When you're as big as he is and unique as he is, the spotlight is bright," Triple H noted. "People just can't wait to see what you can do. So you have to be cautious with it in how you do it. Hopefully, we're giving him just enough to chew on at each moment in time that it works wonderfully. He's got a bright future. Just a quality person, great guy, humble, just loves what he's doing, couldn't be happier. He's one of those success stories.
"When I see him, he makes me smile. He's just one of those guys that you just want to see him succeed. He's an incredible athlete. This takes a long time. What we do, WWE Superstars, is not something that you sort of open up the door, and walk in and there they are. Even people that have been doing it for a long time, it just takes a while, and your improvement is consistent and constant, and then you get to a level where you succeed and people think it took a long time, or they think, why didn't they do it sooner, because they weren't ready yet. But he's a sponge for it. He's worked really really really hard, and it's funny, people just see what he does on TV.
"They see him one time a week on TV. They don't see him in the gym still at the PC. They don't see him in the ring at the PC. They don't see him training every day still to be something special. He's putting in the effort. He is, like I said, a sponge and is one of those hard working, hard work ethic people that is putting in the effort to really be good at this, and I think he will be and you're going to get to see that firsthand. He's not just the big dude standing there. I think he's going to shock a lot of people."