Dolph Ziggler is one of the most tenured performers in WWE today.
Initially debuting as an up-and-coming young gun looking to take the industry by storm, Ziggler has accomplished more or less everything a performer could hope for within The Fed, having won the World Heavyweight Championship twice, the World Tag Team Championship, the NXT Championship, the RAW Tag Team Championship twice, the SmackDown Tag Team Championship, the United States Championship twice, and the Intercontinental Championship on six different occasions for a combined reign of 372 days since his initial debut back in 2004. He's been a member of the Spirit Squad, feuded with The Authority, had a fling was Lana during a break with Rusev, and even became a Dirty Dawg with Robert Roode, and yet, through it all, Ziggler remains strangely underrated, as few put him on the same level as Drew McIntyre, Kevin Owens, and Seth “Freakin” Rollins.
Does Ziggler deserve more praise? You bet, but at this point in his career, the multi-time champion isn't looking to make a run at another mid-card championship or at the WWE Championship, the lone belt he needs to become a Grand Slam Champion, either. No, Ziggler is looking to finish out his career by helping out the guys who are still coming up in the industry, as leaving the WWE, and the wrestling world as a whole, in a better place than he found it in his far more important to his personal growth than another championship reign or an 11th appearance at WrestleMania.
Dolph Ziggler wants to help performers like Theory in WWE.
Speaking with Justin Dhillon of The Wrestling Classic as part of the Casual Conversations series, Ziggler was asked about his current goal within the WWE, and the man sometimes known as “The Natural” showed off his impressively mature take on his career in 2022, as dictated by Fightful:
When it comes to, I don’t know, like championships and moments, no. But a long time ago, a little bit after I won the Money in the Bank contract, I had an idea to where, it was like 2013, that I could, and I was still getting good, I wasn’t great, but I was getting good. I had an idea that maybe I could cash that in and have one more match with Shawn Michaels or something. So I thought that would be kinda neat.
Oh snap, could see eventually see the day where Ziggler, not the Heartbreak Kid, is running the show in NXT and helping to book the next generation of WWE superstars? Or could Ziggler instead choose to pursue a hybrid performer/coach-type role like those held by Maddison Rayne and the other “The Natural,” Dustin Rhodes, in AEW? Either way, with his prime in-ring days winding down, the 42-year-old from Cleveland, Ohio, is looking to give back to the game however he can before his best days are behind him:
When it comes to now, 2022, it’s just finding someone, like a Theory, who’s quickly picking it up, crushing it, and be able to have some time on the weekends, live event matches where we don’t have to go to commercial in 90 seconds, we have 25-30 minutes, and you beat him down, and you see what he could do and you see if he could pass that onto someone else when you’re done. So things like that are much more important to me, leaving the business better than when you started and actually have a meaningful impact on not just young talent or talent the same age or even talent that are older than me. Being able to know that no matter what the win-loss record is out there, no matter what fans online say, everyone in that locker room says this is the guy I want leading my platoon, putting the company on his back, putting me over his shoulder and passing it on to the next generation.
Considering Ziggler and Theory have wrestled on four occasions on either Saturday Night's Main Event or Sunday Stunner, maybe there's some truth to his statement. Maybe Ziggler really is looking to pass along his knowledge to the next generation. Maybe there was some intentionality behind the seemingly random feud within a feud between Ziggler and Theory when the latter was gearing up for a SummerSlam Money in the Bank cash-in attempt, and it was just too subtle to see. Heck, maybe the day will come when Ziggler and Theory actually wrestle together, potentially as a way to combat Johnny Gargano's return to the WWE Universe. Either way, the WWE fans are here for it.
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