That’s A Long Time. AJ Styles Joins A Very Exclusive Club.

Ten out of one hundred and thirty three aren’t bad. The WWE Championship was created back in 1963 and has gone on to become one of the most important titles in the wrestling world. With fifty five years of history, being champion is quite the exclusive club to join. What’s even more impressive is to hold the title for a long time, which means current champion AJ Styles is in a club even more exclusive than most.

According to WWE.com, Styles is now one of the ten longest reigning WWE Champions of all time, with his reign reigning 359 days as of Thursday, surpassing Diesel to join the club. Realistically, Styles could move all the way up to sixth, as he could pass Hulk Hogan (364 days), Randy Savage (371 days), John Cena (381 days) and CM Punk (434 days). The next spot on the list would be Pedro Morales (1027 days), which would require Styles to hold the title until August 31, 2020, or nearly two more years. Styles won the title on SmackDown Live, November 7, 2017 and is scheduled to defend it Friday against Samoa Joe at Crown Jewel.

Here’s how it all started and it’s just nice to see again.

Jinder Mahal vs. AJ Styles - WWE Championship Match: SmackDown LIVE, Nov. 7, 2017

Opinion: This is the kind of thing that I could talk about for days. The title has such a long and fascinating history that I’m sure someone has written a long and detailed book about the whole thing. Styles could surpass Punk’s run by January and then it could be interesting to see how far he could go. He’s not going to move up the ladder any further, but he could put some distance between himself and Punk’s run, which is just fun to watch.

How far do you think Styles will go? Who will take the title from him? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 50,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 5,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his Amazon author page with 28 wrestling books. His latest book is the the Complete 2003 Smackdown Reviews.

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