10 Times The Independent Scene Met The WWE Machine

4. AJ Styles Vs. Roman Reigns - Payback 2016

Owens Cena
WWE.com

AJ Styles is my runaway pick for 'Wrestler Of The Year' so far in 2016. After putting on an all-time classic against Shinsuke Nakamura at NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 10, Styles turned up in the Royal Rumble to finally arrive in WWE, and his guns have been blazing away solidly ever since.

He's had great matches with Chris Jericho, John Cena and others, but it is his first battle against Roman Reigns that wins out for me. It was on that night that the former TNA and ROH star solidified himself as a major player at the top of the WWE card, bumping like a madman in order to get a great match out of the the current (well, recent) WWE golden boy.

The finish produced all sorts of questionable hand movements from most, but that shouldn't take anything away from the hard-hitting bout that came before the McMahons decided to get involved. Reigns is at his best when he is beating the tar out of someone willing to fly all over for him.

Styles? Well, he's just the best.

Contributor
Contributor

Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.