Matt Riddle Says AJ Lee Remarks About “Getting Around” Were Just “Word on the Streets”

Matt Riddle’s ongoing feud with CM Punk just hit another level of awkward. Weeks after WWE Hall of Famer Booker T torched him for “disrespecting the business” and “blowing up the damn bridge” with WWE, Riddle returned to TMZ Inside The Ring to downplay the controversy—and specifically the heat he caught for dragging Punk’s wife, AJ Lee, into the fight.

The host Branson pointed out that of all the wild things Riddle said, it was his offhand remarks about AJ Lee’s past that drew the most backlash. When asked to address it, Riddle tried brushing it off with sarcasm.

“I heard [Booker T] wasn’t happy about… what comment? The AJ… I don’t even know any AJ Lee. I really know what the AJ com—”

Branson quickly interrupted to clarify that fans were more upset about his AJ Lee comments than anything he said about Punk. That led Riddle into a half-hearted explanation that didn’t exactly make things better.

“Hey, that’s just the word on the street. There’s words on the street about me. I get it. I hear you, girl. I hear you by yourself. I hear everybody. But yeah, dude, it is what it is.”

Riddle insisted he wasn’t being malicious—just reacting to what he claimed was wrestling lore.

“And I didn’t mean it mean, you know? It’s just—think about it.”

Then Brandon brought up AJ Lee’s WWE storyline history—kissing Kane, John Cena, Dolph Ziggler on-screen—which Riddle immediately jumped on with a mocking tone.

“I saw you make out with hella wrestlers, dude.”

He capped the segment off by joking about his own track record, holding up a hand gesture and adding:

“Hey, to be fair, you know how many wrestlers I made out with?,” Riddle signaled zero.

While Riddle tried to spin the controversy as harmless locker-room humor, the reaction online suggests otherwise. Critics argue that implying AJ Lee’s past storylines define her legacy—and joking about them while taking shots at her husband—crossed a line.

Even Riddle acknowledged later in the interview that some of the backlash he receives is “his own fault,” but he doubled down that nothing he said came from a place of real disrespect.

Still, dragging a female wrestler into a feud with her husband—especially with off-the-cuff remarks that stir up old narratives—might not be something fans (or locker rooms) are quick to forgive.