A Top Star Will Return This Week, And WWE Has Big Plans For Him

WWE has been without a plethora of its biggest stars since WrestleMania 36, but one of the company’s top heels will be back this week.

According to John Pollock of POST Wrestling, “AJ Styles is set to return on this Monday’s episode [of Raw] and is expected to be part of the Money in the Bank show that will stream on the WWE Network next weekend.” Styles has been out of action since losing to The Undertaker in an epic Boneyard match at WrestleMania 36, reportedly in order to sell the effects of his loss to “The Phenom.” When Styles disappeared from Monday Night Raw following WWE’s flagship pay-per-view, the Wrestling Observer Newsletter (h/t Wrestling-Edge) reported that “it likely won’t be long” until Styles returned, at least in part due to the lack of top heels on the red brand.

Indeed, Raw’s shortage of top villains has really been exposed in recent weeks when Seth Rollins has been virtually the only main event level heel on the show due to the absences of Styles, Randy Orton and Brock Lesnar, who had been the three most pushed heels on the show prior to WrestleMania. As a result, WWE has highlighted a number of rising heels like the trio of Andrade, Austin Theory and Angel Garza, but they have largely served as fodder for Drew McIntyre. With popular babyface stars like Edge and Kevin Owens also off TV, Raw has had an incredibly difficult time maintaining its viewing audience.

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Last week, Raw drew its lowest-ever viewership for a “non-holiday week” episode with an alarmingly low 1.817 million viewers while the show’s main event segment—a contract signing between McIntyre and Rollins—was the least-watched Raw segment ever, with a shocking 1.539 million viewers. Perhaps the most obvious reason why Raw viewership is tanking is because the audience-less shows simply aren’t that appealing, especially during what is traditionally a down period following WrestleMania each year. The lack of so many top names, however, is obviously playing a significant role in WWE’s audience pulling off a disappearing act.

At WrestleMania 36, Rollins, Orton, Lesnar and Styles served as the heels in arguably the four biggest matches for the red brand, but aside from Rollins, not one of those stars has appeared on TV since then. While the post-WrestleMania absence of “The Beast” was expected because that has become customary practice over the past several years, it’s surprising to see WWE choosing to have so many marquee names off TV at the same time. That, however, is expected to remain the norm for the time being, with WWE choosing not to utilize those top stars at a time when its audience is likely going to be noticeably smaller anyway.

Vince McMahon has famously blamed Raw’s plummeting TV viewership on the lack of stars like Lesnar and the focus on its up-and-coming villains, so rather than riding out the storm of trying to cultivate new top talent, it’s likely that we will see the gradual return of stars like Orton, Styles, Owens and others who typically appear regularly on TV. With high-profile SmackDown talents like Roman Reigns and Sami Zayn voluntarily removing themselves from TV due to concerns regarding the COVID-19 pandemic, WWE desperately needs some star power to prevent its viewership from falling even further than it already has.

While the return of Styles will help, having him back in action isn’t going to suddenly turn around the red brand’s ratings woes if it doesn’t coincide with better storytelling. Having Styles replace the “injured” Apollo Crews in the Money in the Bank ladder match, however, is a great way to reintroduce Styles into the storyline loop and potentially create a compelling angle for the now-solo “Phenomenal One.”