Before he signed with WWE in 2016, WWE were desperate to sign AJ Styles. With his previous Indy, TNA and NJPW work it was easy to see why. One of the most amazing wrestlers of his time and any time, Styles is future Hall Of Fame material, and in 30 years time, you will still remember the name – AJ Styles.
Styles began his wrestling career in 1998, he was trained by Rick Michaels, he won his first title (Television Championship) at National Championship Wrestling in 99. He then started on lesser known Indy brands. In 01, Styles took part in All Pro Wrestling’s King of the Indies tournament, where he won the first round but was eliminated by Christopher Daniels.
In 01, Styles even worked with WWF’s biggest rivals – WCW, he was renamed as Air Styles and put into a gimmick with Air Paris called Air Raid. They entered and were eliminated from the newly created WCW Cruiserweight Tag Team Championship Tournament.
Alongside the start of his time within Total Non-Stop Action, Styles also wrestled for Ring of Honor, where once again he went against Christopher Daniels and the likes of Low Ki and Paul London. Styles was ROH Tag Team Championship with Amazing Red, after this reign ended, he took on a protégé of Jimmy Rave and attempted to be ROH World Champion.
Styles defeated Bryan Danielson to become number on contender for the championship, but he however was unsuccessful in capturing the championship from Samoa Joe. Styles did, however capture the inaugural ROH Pure Wrestling Champion defeating CM Punk, Matt Stryker and his protégé Jimmy Rave. In 04, TNA withdrew it’s contracted wrestlers from all ROH events and Styles vacated the title.
AJ Styles entered into a feud with Jimmy Rave, who claimed Styles stole his move the “Rave Clash”, in which Styles called it the Styles Clash. After losing to Rave, he then beat him with Mick Foley as the special guest referee, the loser could no longer use the clash move. Styles had another unsuccessful ROH World Championship attempt and an unsuccessful ROH Tag Team Championship attempt with Matt Sydal. AJ Styles said he was taking a few months off of ROH, however the commentators said that he had fought his final match.
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