Arn Anderson reveals that John Cena felt WWE did not need AJ Styles
AJ Styles' arrival in WWE changed the entire wrestling industry in quite a few ways. The impact of his arrival was felt and he has been one Superstar that WWE has been booking consistently throughout. AJ Styles has held multiple titles in the company over a very short period of time and even had one of his best matches against John Cena at SummerSlam. However, Arn Anderson, the former WWE producer, revealed on his ARN podcast, that John Cena actually felt that WWE did not need AJ Styles and that they needed to build their own stars from WWE NXT.
Arn Anderson on wanting to bring AJ Styles to WWE; John Cena's reaction
Arn Anderson recalled how during a time in WWE, John Cena was running out of opponents in the company. At that time, TNA, now known as Impact Wrestling, was going really strong.
"I was pleasantly surprised. I pushed for AJ. There was a point in time when Cena had run out of opponents. I was on that whole ride with John for all those years, over a decade I should imagine. I was sitting there and I was talking to him, and it was when TNA was doing well."
Arn Anderson said that he told John Cena that if WWE brought some wrestlers from Impact Wrestling to WWE, then John Cena and other wrestlers would have an easier time. Among the wrestler, he mentioned AJ Styles, Bobby Roode, and 'Cowboy' James Storm.
However, John Cena reacted very differently and talked about getting WWE NXT talent up to a better level instead.
"I remember I was sitting there with Cena one afternoon. I was sitting backstage at a table. I said, 'You know John, it would really beef up the company if we would go out and steal Bobby Roode, AJ Styles, and The Cowboy — James Storm. If we just brought those three guys in, it would give you a whole plethora of new opponents. It would give a lot of guys new opponents.' That's just those three guys, and I singled them out because of their work and their psychology. I knew I could have been a fit helping them, and they would catch right on and they would be a very, very, good fit. John said, 'Hey, we got NXT, we make our own stars.' I am sure he was just transferring Vince's psychology to me when he said that. I knew what those guys could do in a match for John if you gave them 6 to 9 months to come in and get over."
It may be safe to say that John Cena changed his mind about AJ Styles once he actually worked with him in WWE.