We Haven’t Heard The Last Of Dolph Ziggler

Many observers were surprised when Dolph Ziggler defeated Baron Corbin & Bobby Roode at Clash of Champions to win the United States Championship for the second time in his career. I was not one of them. After all, Ziggler’s been grooming himself for a career post-wrestling as a political talking head. The type of political talking head whose viewpoints would fall in line with the viewpoints of WWE’s current ownership. Making a man like Ziggler US Champion seemed to make perfect sense to me on a number of levels.

The hang-up is that most people think that Ziggler’s post-wrestling life will be starting pretty soon. I’ve lost track of how many times the Internet has reported that Dolph Ziggler will be leaving WWE. Whenever his contract is about to expire, everybody decides that Dolph would be better off elsewhere. Maybe he should wrestle somewhere else. Maybe he should be a comedian. Maybe he should be a political pundit. We all have ideas for Dolph Ziggler’s future.

He keeps coming back to WWE. It’s tough to blame somebody that grew up watching pro wrestling for staying with the biggest company in the world as long as humanly possible. Being a WWE Superstar was his dream, and who wants their dream to come to an end?

Maybe he finally does. He walked out of SmackDown Live two weeks ago & hasn’t been heard from since.

See, Dolph is all upset with us in the WWE Universe because we’ve never given him the appreciation he feels he deserves. This has been a theme with Dolph for some time now. He wants the kind of loyalty from us that John Cena & Roman Reigns get from eight year olds. Don’t we all? Ziggler’s never really gotten that type of acclaim from crowds. Sure, the Internet has liked him for most of his career, but that doesn’t really count.

Since the fans won’t give Dolph the respect he feels he deserves, he’s going home. You have to give him credit for sticking to his word there. Ususally when bad guy wrestlers say they’ll leave if the fans don’t quit making fun of them, it’s a cue for the fans to keep making fun of them. The wrestler stays anyway, because their anger over the situation needs to be taken out on their opponent. Ziggler decided to skip that part and just leave. Good on him.

That means that something needs to be done with the United States Championship.

You know, I said a couple of weeks ago that I trusted Daniel Bryan. After hearing him describe Ziggler as “undoubtedly one of the all time greats”, I’m wondering if there’s something going on with him. Don’t get me wrong, Ziggler is a fine wrestler & has had a solid run, but I have to draw the line well below “all time great” for his career. I guess it depends where you draw the line for such a designation. My line might be higher than most, but I’ve always had pretty high standards for most things in life.

That’s why I’m still single.

Anywho, SmackDown Live has to move forward without Dolph Ziggler & a new United States Champion must be crowned. Bryan has started an eight-man tournament to crown a new champion, and the first two semi-finalists have already emerged from the first round.

Bobby Roode has to be considered the favorite to win the tournament. His defeat of former US Champion Baron Corbin on Tuesday night along with his pre-existing issue with Ziggler makes him the logical choice to emerge as United States Champion. Unlike many of his fellow foreign-born Superstars, Roode is more concerned with being Glorious at all times than having an issue with the country where he makes his money. He’s won championships everywhere he’s gone, and it only seems like a matter of time before he claims some gold on SmackDown Live.

Jinder Mahal won the other first round match on Tuesday night. The Modern-Day Maharaja was unsuccessful in regaining the WWE Championship from AJ Styles, but he’s not going to dwell on that failure. Winning the United States Championship would add another feather to his cap & further establish himself as one of WWE’s current top stars. He certainly can’t be ruled out as the eventual victor, but I feel it’s more likely that he will lose to the eventual champion to add more shine to their victory. Not many men have defeated Jinder since his arrival to the blue brand.

The other competitors in the tournament have yet to be announced, but there are a couple of names that come to my mind as contenders for the championship.

Sami Zayn has seen his profile rise since forming an alliance with his best friend, Kevin Owens. KO emerged as the top contender to the WWE Championship heading into 2018 with his victory over Styles on Tuesday night, so I don’t expect him to be involved in this tournament. Sami, on the other hand, would certainly be interested in obtaining his first championship since making his way to WWE’s main roster.

Mojo Rawley seems to be somebody that WWE has big plans for. He went over his former tag team partner Zack Ryder rather strongly on the Clash of Champions pre-show and seems to be ready for bigger things. He had a big win at WrestleMania & didn’t do much afterwards. Perhaps now will be his time to shine.

It feels like now would be as good a time as any for a New Day member to seek singles gold. They’ve come up short in recent Tag Team Championship opportunities and probably need to seek other ventures at the moment. Big E, Xavier Woods & Kofi Kingston would all be viable contenders here…of course the odds tend to favor the big fella.

If we’re talking about the New Day, we should probably talk about Rusev Day as well. Rusev’s popularity has reached new heights lately with his insistence that every day is in fact Rusev Day. He’s already claimed the US Championship twice, so perhaps a third time will be in order soon. I wouldn’t count Aiden English out either, as the Shakespeare of Song has reached another gear while singing Rusev’s praises. His frog splash needs a little work, but I appreciate the son-in-law of the late Eddie Guerrero adding the move to his repertoire.

Whoever the other competitors are, Roode will be the clear favorite. As he should be. Whenever this tournament comes to an end, odds are that Dolph Ziggler will be ready to return. He’ll be unhappy that another United States Champion has been crowned in his absence. There will be a challenge & a match will ensue.

Dolph’s borrowed more than a few things from Shawn Michaels throughout his career. The long tights he’s been sporting lately. The superkick. The ridiculous bumping. My guess is that he’ll borrow something else that belongs to Shawn to decide this US Championship issue: the ladder match.

He left his title belt in the ring, so they can’t hang two belts like they did at WrestleMania X. Other than that, the story will be pretty similar. If Dolph Ziggler actually plans on leaving WWE, it would be a fitting note for him to go out on.

I’ll believe it when I see it.