Gunther has had three famous career ends within the last year. Goldberg in July, John Cena in December and AJ Styles in January. Speaking at a WWE retrospective, Gunther revealed that of the three, retiring Styles carried the most personal weight for him.
"AJ is somewhat different, like, you have the WCW legend Goldberg, then you have the guy who stands for WWE, then you have AJ who is somewhat similar to me because he did very well here, but a lot of the things that people love him for happened before WWE."
Gunther was honest about how much Styles meant to him as a viewer before they shared the locker room.
"He's one of those guys, the generation of wrestling I came up with, we looked up to guys like AJ Styles. I remember when he was in New Japan, and we'd always watch his big matches there, they were awesome. There was a time when I was really grinding and developing, and there were things I looked up to. I always had a lot of respect for AJ's work.
"It almost felt like, from the pure heart of the wrestler, it felt almost more important to me than the Cena match. But on screen, to be able to rub it in and try to ruin the last race was a lot of fun."
Gunther details what made AJ Styles' retirement different from other recent matches
Gunther also noted that the Styles match worked dramatically in a way that the Goldberg and Cena matches could not be completely replicated. With both Goldberg and Cena, the retirement timeline was publicly revealed, removing a layer of uncertainty from the outcome. The styles were different.
"That's the beauty of it, because with Goldberg and Cena, everyone knew it was their last match, and I think with AJ, people weren't so sure it was going to be their last match. A good group of them expected AJ to win and move his career forward, but he left on his own terms."
This is something that not many wrestlers can manage; It's always best to get to the point where people still remember you, not to the point where people say, 'Ah, it was that time.' So, hats off to AJ, great career, great wrestler, but I got it taken away, what can I do?”
The road to a Styles match began following Gunther's victory over Cena in December, when he publicly bragged about tapping out Cena despite Cena's long-standing motto of "never give up". An upset Styles confronted him, putting Styles' career in jeopardy and setting up his Royal Rumble match. Styles will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame this weekend as part of the WrestleMania 42 weekend festivities at Dolby Live at Park MGM in Las Vegas on Friday, April 17.
