AJ Styles pays tribute to former AEW Champion during match against John Cena at WWE Crown Jewel

AJ Styles paid homage to a former AEW World Champion during his match against John Cena at WWE Crown Jewel. The star in question, Samoa Joe, was one of The Phenomenal One's greatest career rivals.

The latest iteration of WWE's Crown Jewel emanated from the RAC Arena in Perth, Australia. The PLE featured a blockbuster singles showdown between AJ Styles and John Cena in what is likely to be the last time the two legends will face off inside the squared circle, with the Cenation leader set to retire later this year.

Both Cena and Styles pulled out all the stops to defeat one another, even borrowing from the move-sets of some of their most iconic rivals to gain the advantage over their opponent. At one point, AJ locked the "Greatest of All Time" in the Coquina Clutch, the formidable submission hold best known as one of AEW trios champion Samoa Joe's finishers.

The Samoan Submission Machine spent nearly seven years in WWE, where he had rekindled his acclaimed rivalry with AJ Styles. Cena and Joe, on the other hand, went toe-to-toe in singles action during two house shows back in 2017, besides being on opposing sides during a tag match on Monday Night RAW and later in the RAW vs Smackdown Survivor Series Elimination Match that same year.

Samoa Joe has an AEW title match scheduled later this month

On the Six Year Anniversary edition of Wednesday Night Dynamite, Samoa Joe and his trios partner Powerhouse Hobbs teamed up with Adam Page to defeat Jon Moxley, Claudio Castagnoli and Daniel Garcia of The Death Riders. Tensions flared between The Cowboy and The Destroyer after the latter took exception to Page's conduct toward him during and after the bout. The two stars exchanged words and nearly came to blows after Joe taunted Page for never having beaten him before hitting him with a sucker punch. This later prompted The Hangman to challenge The Samoan Submission Specialist to face him in an AEW World Championship match at WrestleDream 2025.

A new match graphic for Hangman vs Samoa Joe at AEW WrestleDream [Image Credits: All Elite Wrestling on X]

It remains to be seen if Joe will be able to reclaim the World Title from the Tony Khan-led promotion's so-called "Main Character" later this month.

Edited by Anurag Mukherjee