A notable statement has been made by WWE Hall of Famer Bully Ray regarding the booking of the upcoming John Cena versus AJ Styles match at Crown Jewel. Speaking on Busted Open Radio, Ray stated he was not “blown away” by the announcement, citing the lack of a clear face-heel dynamic as a primary weakness in a match between two established babyfaces.
While both John Cena and WWE have promoted the contest on social media, Bully Ray proposed a specific creative angle to build intrigue. He argued that for the match to become compelling, one of the competitors must assume the role of a heel during the bout itself.
Ray identified AJ Styles as the ideal candidate to make the turn, creating a tangible obstacle for Cena to overcome. He then detailed exactly how this mid-match angle could be executed.
“What you do in a baby face versus babyface match to start making it intriguing within the body of the match? Within the body of the match. What does one of the baby faces do to make this match more intriguing? Somebody assumes the heel role. So, AJ is out wrestling John, or John is out wrestling AJ. One of them gets frustrated. One of them assumes the heel role and does something heel-ish. And I could see this happening with AJ, where AJ gets a little frustrated and all of sudden, boom, punches John in the back of the head. Down goes John. You’ll hear people start to boo. I don’t know if people want to see that, but that’s normally how you can build baby face baby face in the body of a match. So that when the one two three happens, John has actually overcome something.”
This commentary on character alignment comes as Cena is in the midst of his farewell tour, which is scheduled to conclude in December. This final run recently received a “C” grade from fellow Hall of Famer Eric Bischoff, who pointed to Cena’s brief heel persona earlier this year—his first in over two decades—as a primary reason for the critique.