Add as a preferred source on Google Sami Zayn is in the biggest moment of his entire WWE career after finally winning the Undisputed WWE Championship at Night of Champions in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
However, before his crowning moment against Cody Rhodes and Gunther, Zayn went through one of the most difficult stretches of his recent run, especially after his loss to Drew McIntyre at the Royal Rumble.
On that night, McIntyre made his first defense of the Undisputed WWE Championship and defeated Zayn with two Claymore Kicks, maintaining a dominant record against him. For Sami, that result had a bigger impact than it seemed at the time.
During an appearance on WWE Recap, Zayn said he only understood the weight of that loss after finally winning the world title.
“I think I only pieced it together now once the weight of the world came off my shoulders and was replaced with the weight of this championship gold. That’s when I kind of realized how damaging that last loss at the Rumble was. Because I realized, oh no, I burnt this card. I can’t play this hand again. The cinderella story of the underdog who finally wins the big one, it’s been played now. I had it in Montreal, I had it here in Riyadh. You can’t ask them to come along a third time at that point. Because even in reality, it was actually like the ninth of 10th time, at that point. But, that story really getting to marinate and really being the crux of this story, the focal point of the story going into the match, you can’t tell that story again. Because, you know, they just won’t buy it again.”
“They’ve already been on board and you know, you can only ask them to come on the train for so long and that’s why I mean what I say when I’m talking about the ride or dies because for as much as, you know, I like to pretend that it didn’t bother me at all. Some of the fans turning their backs or getting fed up with me or my story or whatever, yeah, it hurt, it hurt, and the fans that didn’t jump off, that means a lot to me. The ride-or-die fans that stayed, it means a lot to me, and there’s a part of me that my feelings are or were very hurt by these fans that are turning their backs on me. But at the same time, part of me kind of understood it because it’s like, how many times can I ask them to stay and come up short? That’s what I really think about it. That’s when I access what I call higher-plane Sami, when I think on a more deeper and spiritual level. But on the surface, I’m just like anyone else. I get my feelings hurt when I devote my entire life to trying to win for these people, and then half of them are jumping off board and going, oh, we’re done. That hurts man, that hurts. My whole thing is my connection with the fans. “
“Some people, their thing is this or that or they’re cool or they’re — whatever — a counterculture. Everybody’s got their little thing. My thing was the fans and the connection of the fans. So, to lose half of them or whatever, man, I don’t know. I like to pretend I don’t care and I like to pretend like, ‘Oh, go ahead, boo if you wanna boo. Think I care? Got my ride or dies’ but man, I can’t sit here and pretend it doesn’t hurt. But, it hurts a little less now that I got this, you know?”
The comments also help explain Zayn’s more unstable demeanor in recent months, when he started getting booed by a large portion of the crowd.