AJ Styles makes his long-awaited return to WWE television on last week’s edition of SmackDown.
He got injured while working a match. Carmelo Hayes went over during the match, while Styles staggered to the back. WWE later revealed that Styles had a mid-foot ligament sprain. Later in the show, WWE showed Styles getting assessed by the medical staff before departing the arena on crutches. Many fans saw this as a potential injury angle.
Styles had not appeared on television since June’s Clash at the Castle event, when he replaced Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. Throughout his absence, Styles was claimed to be healthy and merely waiting for creative ideas.
Following the show, Fightful Select stated that this was a storyline angle, and Styles was alright. However, Dave Meltzer stated in the daily update on F4Wonline.com that Styles’ “injury on Friday was legit and not storyline. He’s getting an MRI done to see the severity of it.”
Fightful has officially confirmed that Styles is injured. Sean Ross Sapp stated, “The word internally is that he’s injured. We will follow up.”
The word internally is that he's injured. We will follow up
— Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful.com (@SeanRossSapp) October 7, 2024
You can check out footage of the moment below:
Yeah AJ Styles is injured for real #Smackdown pic.twitter.com/tSlgquArHg
— Ahmed/The Ears/IG: BigBizTheGod 🇸🇴 (@big_business_) October 5, 2024
