10 Weird (But TRUE) Facts For WWE In 2025

6. AJ Lee's Long-Awaited Return

WWE WrestleMania 41 Night 1 Jey Uso
WWE

“Never say never” is a well-worn phrase used in wrestling when fans ask whether a certain performer will ever lace up the boots or appear for a company again.

In recent years, several “white whales” have shockingly returned to the ring in WWE, despite many believing that it would never happen.

The Rock returned to the ring at WrestleMania 40 an astonishing eight years (2,825 days) since he “wrestled” a six-second match against Erick Rowan at Mania 32.

CM Punk famously walked out of WWE after the 2014 Royal Rumble. He returned at Survivor Series 2023 and finally competed at the 2024 Royal Rumble, a 10-year stretch of 3,653 days.

But Punk’s wife AJ Lee has both of them beat. AJ last wrestled on the Raw after WrestleMania 31 and announced her retirement. Despite regularly being rumored to appear as a surprise entrant in the Royal Rumble for years, it wasn’t until Wrestlepalooza this year that Lee finally competed again, a gap of 3,827 days.

Who could have predicted that Punk’s cold heart (toward WWE) would melt before AJ donned her Chuck Taylors again?

Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.