In an appearance on Out of Character with Ryan Satin, WWE’s AJ Styles talked about his feud with The Undertaker last year. Styles raved about working with Taker in their Boneyard Match at WrestleMania 36 and how much pride he took from getting to work with the WWE legend in his final match.
“I am proud that I had the opportunity to work with The Undertaker,” Styles said. “And it was icing on the cake to have one of the better cinematic matches that WWE has done. I was very proud of it. I’m sure Taker was proud of it.
“It was one of those things where you’re not really sure how fans were going to take it, but it was exactly what we both needed. I was certainly, and pleasantly, surprised when they said ‘you’re doing a Boneyard match, and it’s gonna be different.’ I’m like ‘OK, cool! Not a match in front of nobody? Perfect.’”
Styles noted that while he was not able to have an ring-match with Taker, the Boneyard match went off how they had planned.
“It was exactly what we had envisioned. I would love to have had the opportunity to work with him before he retired because we jelled so well in that Boneyard match.”
Styles also talked about reaching out to Taker’s wife, Michelle McCool, afterwards in order to get Taker a retirement gift. He ultimately went with McCool’s suggestion; the gloves Style wore in their match together.
“I called his wife and was like ‘hey, what does he want?!’” Styles recalled. “Cause I needed to get him something. She was just like ‘well, get him your gloves. That would mean a lot to him if you signed your gloves.’ I was like ‘al right!’ So, yeah, Michelle hooked me up, and hopefully that was a gift he enjoyed. He actually sent his gloves to me with a very nice thank you letter, which meant the world to me. I have them sitting on my table in the office. It meant a lot.”
