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A. J. Styles Gets Made

Posted: Sep 5th 2009 By: CMBurnham

A. J. Styles is one of the most talented wrestlers working today. In fact, it's hard to describe him without actually resorting to his moniker: "phenomenal." He has been around in TNA since its very inception and is still one of the top billed players in the organization to this very day.

Made is a show on MTV where high school students get a crash course in wish-fulfillment. An expert is brought in to essentially "make over' the teen into whatever they desire - be it a prom queen or a motocross racer. So who would you call in to help a young girl become a pro-wrestler? You'd call A. J, Styles of course.

Styles (along with The Beautiful People and Taylor Wilde) is set to appear on Made this upcoming Sunday, September 6th, to help a young girl try and become a TNA Knockout. IGN TV had a chance to talk to Styles and ask him about what it takes to turn a young girl into a tough-as-nails grappler. Also, how does he feel about his finishing maneuver, The "Styles Clash," getting co-opted by WWE Women's Champion Michelle McCool?

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As we called Styles, he was endearingly in the middle of playing Call of Duty: World at War - incurring the wrath of other players while hitting "ridiculous head shots."

IGN TV: What are you favorite games right now?

A. J. Styles: (with Duty gunshots in the background) Madden and NCAA. Big football fan of course. Down here in the South we have to go with college football first. Madden was a little different for me because it was a bit slower than NCAA, and I love NCAA. But then once I started playing Madden I got used to the controls and it wasn't so bad. (more Duty gunshots). You know, (if you were) any other person and I would say "alright man, I'm getting off right now." But you can understand what's going on. I'm about to piss some guys off and that's just awesome.

IGN: I know a lot of the TNA guys are gamers. Who else do you play with?

Styles: Joe and I play. Kaz. Sabin. Eric Young is a big Madden guy and NCAA guy. So is Hernandez. He's actually the biggest NCAA guy. For sure. Dude, we have had tournaments - NCAA tournaments - before a Pay Per View. They've got a TV monitor in the back and we set up the Xbox.

IGN: You mean on a Sunday before the actual show?

Styles: Yep. We've had games right before the show. It creates a crowd, man. James Storm is also another guy that plays.

IGN: Who comes out on top?

Styles: When it comes to NCAA, James is a little bit better. Or at least he was last year because you could run around with the quarterback and there were no big hits on him. That's what I love about this year. You try running outside with a quarterback and he gets hit. It's gonna be an interception. That's the cool thing about it. It's more realistic. Where James, when he plays, is not as realistic because he just runs all over the place with the quarterback ? and is able to throw, opposite field, a perfect spiral and that just sucks. You can't play like that in real life.

IGN: Switching gears here ? you're going to be on Made this Sunday. On MTV.

Styles: Yeah, man. I trained a young lady. A sophomore in high school. She wants to be a pro-wrestler.

IGN: Do you find that, when females want to be pro-wrestlers, that there are those who want to wrestle and those who just want to look pretty? Like there are some who don't really want to get in there and learn the ring work?

Styles: I'm sure that depends on the money that's being offered. There are athletic girls that want to wrestle. They train somewhere else and wrestle on the independents and make their way to TNA or WWE. But then they have things like the "Diva Search." Christy Hemme actually won that thing and she didn't know a thing about wrestling. Now that she's come over to TNA she's learned a bit more. More than she ever has, in fact. I know that because I've actually trained with her.

IGN: Not to give away the episode too much but how did it go with this sophomore girl?

Styles: The thing about the Made show is that you've got about four or five weeks to get it done and when I trained it was definitely a lot longer than four or five weeks. And you've got to take these falls and these bumps every day, and your body isn't supposed to be doing that every day. So she was in a lot of pain. A lot of pain. I don't know how it's going to look on the actual TV show, because I haven't seen it. Hopefully I don't seem like a jerk, but yeah, she got beat up pretty bad. At one point she went to the hospital so, it's rough, man. No doubt. Especially in a crash course like that.

IGN: And this training you do with her - does it lead up to a match?

Styles: Yeah, it's a match. She'll be wrestling with a Knockout against two other Knockouts.

IGN: What's it take to break into the business these days in your opinion?

Styles: It's that same thing I've been saying for years. It's all about experience. You gotta get in there and get experience. The independent scene I think is very important because you get to create your own style, and you don't follow everyone else's. I truly believe that's what separates TNA from WWE is that most of our guys are not from the WWE, they're from the independents. They've got their own style. In the WWE they tend to just be all the same guy. They use all the same moves, and there's very little that separates those guys. Same with the girls. I mean there are a couple guys in there that went through the independents. Evan Bourne, who's one of my really good friends, has done that. He's an awesome talent. Rey Mysterio had to do that. He went from Mexico to ECW, to WCW ? but it was his own style that went along with him. I think that's what makes TNA different.

IGN: TNA's new Spike TV deal allows you guys to look at other opportunities on other networks. The actual matches don't get a lot of focus on Impact because you have to squeeze so much in. What do you think about another show?

Styles: Another show would be awesome. That way we can give more time to the actual wrestling matches, rather than the rest. Some seem really short. With another program, or maybe 30 more minutes, I mean that's three more matches maybe. That's huge. And I hope that there's another station that wants to bring us on because it seems like the WWE is trying to grab every station and get a hold of them and get their product on. They're sucking up all the stations.

IGN: Well now they're talking about their own station.

Styles: Really?

IGN: Yeah. Vince has expressed interest in a WWE channel.

Styles: That's a lot of wrestling.

IGN: It is.

Styles: Sounds more like XFL going on with that one.

IGN: Or that body-building thing he had going with Luger. I remember that one. Listen, I have to ask. WWE Diva Michelle McCool has come under some fire on Twitter for using your finisher, "The Styles Clash," as her finisher. How do you feel about that? What's the etiquette in the industry? Do people ask to use other people's moves, or is that something that just happens when you're a competitor?

Styles: Gail Kim's one of my really good friends, and I asked her about that and we talked about it and she (McCool) does do my move, but I'm flattered that she would think to use that move. It doesn't bother me at all. I guess it might be different if a guy was doing it and calling it something else. At one point Crash Holly was doing the "Crash Landing" which was The Styles Clash, but little did I know that they were just big fans of the move. Crash was a good guy. We got along great. We actually did an independent show and we both were going for the Styles Clash and we got into an argument. It was really funny. The fact of the matter is this. People know it. That's the Styles Clash. That's my move. I came up with it on my own. It's okay. I understand, you gotta come up with something and there's not a lot of moves in the world. It's hard to be different. But it's cool with me. Now it would be different if it was a guy in my own company. But there is that one dude. What's his name? I'm like, good grief, this guy does everyone else's move and hasn't come up with one. He's a heck of an athlete. Morrison. Yeah, I've seen him do a lot of Low Ki's moves. He does my Spiral Tap. I was like, "Man, this guy watches a lot of tape." But he does them well, so I can't say anything bad about him. He does them well. He's heck of an athlete.[b/]

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A. J. Styles' episode of Made is set to air this Sunday, September 6th, on MTV. Check your local listings.

Tags: A. J. Styles, WWE, TNA, WCW, ECW