AJ Styles on Possibly Headlining ‘WrestleMania 34,’ Jinder Mahal

WWE Champion AJ Styles was a guest on Lilian Garcia’s Chasing Glory podcast where he gave his thoughts on working against Jinder Mahal and possibly headlining ‘WrestleMania’ this year against Shinsuke Nakamura.

Styles comments on the possibility of a ‘WrestleMania 34’ match against Shinsuke Nakamura if he can get past ‘Fastlane’ tonight.

“There could be a chance of headlining WrestleMania this year. I’ve got to make it through Fastlane before I can do this, but if I get the opportunity to wrestle Shinsuke Nakamura at WrestleMania, a match that no one has seen on U.S. soil, and only happened once in Japan, this could be huge. I need some payback [for NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 10], but he doesn’t have the home field advantage this time. So it’s exciting to think that something like that could happen, even if it’s not the main event. They’re going to wish it had been. I expect this match to be amazing. Nakamura is a great talent here and I feel like were going to tear the place apart to be honest with you.”

He continued, explaining why he’d prefer to hear ‘you earned it’ as opposed to ‘you deserve it.’

“If you earn it, they can never say you didn’t work for it. Like, ‘you earned it’. That’s more powerful to me than ‘deserve’. You can’t take something I’ve earned from me.”

As you will recall, Styles defeated former WWE Champion Jinder Mahal on an episode of ‘Smackdown Live’ shortly before ‘Survivor Series 2017’ to become the Champion where he was set to face Brock Lesnar in a Champion vs. Champion match. Relive that historic victory against Mahal below.

Relive AJ Styles' historic WWE Championship win over Jinder Mahal

Styles explains that Mahal wasn’t accustomed to working like a top guy at first, having come from jobber territory to a main event talent.

“At first, it was different. Jinder came in and went straight to the top when he came to SmackDown and it was a position he wasn’t in. And when you get to this upper level, things change in the way that you work in the ring, the way you act, everything. And he had to learn really quick basically how to be a big star in WWE, which sounds easy, but it’s not.”

Continuing, Styles explained that Mahal was more than receptive to losing the title to him.

“He took it well. I literally said, ‘Jinder, what do you think?’ I wanted to know what he thought, if he was okay with it, because that’s important to me that, ‘I’m not better than you. You’ve been a great champion. What do you think, man?’ and he was okay with it. Again, he has been in the business for a while now, so he was very mature in the way he handled it and I appreciate that. Sometimes you have to wait your tour and sometimes it takes longer than you’d like, but eventually you’ll be back on top.”

With H/T to William Windsor of WrestlingInc for the transcription.

Did you enjoy the Styles vs. Mahal match? Are you excited for a possible vs. Shinsuke one?

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