On the January 19th episode of WWE Raw, Gunther goaded his new rival, AJ Styles, into putting his career on the line for a match between the two of them at the Royal Rumble this year.
And it is telling that for many wrestling fans, it is a foregone conclusion that Styles will lose this match and retire. WWE and Styles have already made it clear that the Phenomenal One will officially hang up his cleats in 2026 at some point.
When that announcement was made by the former TNA legend, it was assumed that, like John Cena last year, Styles would retire towards the end of the year. But, alas, unlike Cena, AJ isn’t going to get a retirement tour.
AJ Styles is on the verge of retirement
So Styles could very well retire in January at the Royal Rumble, bringing his entire career full circle, as he debuted in WWE after an amazing career in TNA and NJPW back in January 2016 at the Rumble.
A span of 10 years exactly in WWE would be something worth celebrating, and it would be fitting for Styles to go out to the same man that his great rival John Cena passed out against.
And if Gunther is indeed the one to retire Styles, then he will have retired the GOAT of WWE and the GOAT of TNA, the two biggest American wrestling promotions of the 2000s millennium, as his first two big kills as one of the new top heels in WWE.
Randy Orton was dubbed The Legend Killer back in the day for going after the biggest names of the past in pro wrestling like Mick Foley and doing his best to embarrass them.
Well, Gunther is the modern day Legend Killer. He is killing legends by ending their careers. There is no bigger career to end than Cena’s, and Styles would also be quite the iconic retirement victory.
Gunther just keeps getting better and better and gaining more and more clout. He is universally loved and hated at the same time, and while people respect him to the utmost degree for his promos and in ring work, they still hate him. He is not a cool heel at all.
He is one of the few guys who can believably retire Cena, Styles, and any other legend while remaining a great heel and making wrestling fans legitimately sad for those retirements. If Cody Rhodes is Cena’s heir, then Gunther might be, in a weird way, Orton’s.
Joe helped manage the pro wrestling site Daily DDT from 2017 to 2019. He has appeared in many wrestling podcasts and has had his work featured by mainstream media sites and professional wrestlers themselves. Joe also covers soccer, writing about Tottenham for Hotspur HQ, Real Madrid for A Trip to Cibeles, and general world football for The Trivela Effect.