WWE star Sami Zayn recently appeared on After The Bell with Corey Graves for an in-depth interview covering all things pro wrestling. During the discussion, Zayn talked about going to Saudi Arabia for Night of Champions:
“It was a really, really, really kind of a heavy trip, to be honest. There was a lot that went into it. First of all, the fact that I haven’t been there in a few years, and that there’s been so much speculation as to why I’m not going and what’s the political reasoning, this and that. I won’t get into all of it, but I’ll tell you 99.9% of what you’ve read online about his subject, completely fabricated, people assuming things and then running with those assumptions and adding on to them. It’s wild. I think it’s anytime they can’t get a concrete answer, that’s kind of what tends to happen. I think that’s like human nature, almost.”
“It’s been years since I’ve been back to the Middle East. I think the last time I was there was 20, maybe 16, in Dubai, possibly, so it’s been a little while. Of course, as you saw on the Premium Live Event, all this to say, I’m Arabic, I’m Muslim, all this stuff, and that’s like my part of the world. I understand those people. Those are my people. When I went there, I got to go to Mecca, which was just a surreal experience. I also saw my uncles that I hadn’t seen in 25 years. I have cousins that I haven’t seen in 25 years. I met my great uncle that I didn’t even know existed. So it was pretty heavy in a lot of ways. It had a lot of weight. Then the actual event itself and the reception from the audience, it’s kind of what I’ve been waiting for, for a while, in a way, because again, I always felt like I would have been the natural representative for those shows and I just wasn’t. So it was good to finally be put in that position and in a main event spot opposite Roman and Solo and the story that’s kind of been carrying the company for a minute now. So I don’t know, it felt like it all kind of just came together perfectly. I couldn’t have asked for a better way to go back. It was perfect.”
If he realized how unique The Bloodline storyline was as it was unfolding:
For me, I definitely felt it. I knew it. Yeah, I knew it pretty early on actually, especially, I don’t know, really come maybe September? So this is a while back. That’s almost, what is that, six months ago? Maybe more. It’s something I’m particularly proud of, but also like a bit shocked by because if I may be so bold as to expose my own insecurity, it’s almost a byproduct of trying to keep yourself grounded and keep yourself humble. I don’t go out of my way to call myself a draw. I think WWE is the draw, and then within the product, you have components that are going to really help the product and I’ve always viewed myself as that. But this was the first time when I could look at something that I was doing and I’d be like, no, no. This is driving business. This is drawing with every metric imaginable, merchandise, ratings, social media engagements, just general fan interest. Everything you have to go buy, live live events, attendance, everything was going up. Everything has been up. So it’s really the first time in my career where I’m like, I could point to something and go, to use an old school expression, this drew money. This drew serious money. So that’s cool. I kind of realized that pretty early on.”
Concerning the significance of incorporating Kevin Owens and their real-life friendship into the Bloodline storyline:
“That reality that you’re talking about is why it worked. If it wasn’t Kevin, the whole thing wouldn’t have worked because for me to be put in that predicament, for me to have my loyalty tested, the crux of all that was that I had this allegiance to someone who’s legitimately my oldest and longest friend in the business. Everyone knows that story, that it’s 20 years deep and all that. So if we don’t have that, the story doesn’t have that same believability. It doesn’t have that same thing holding the whole thing together.”
“The same could be said about the Usos and Roman in part of why that is so successful is because it is a legitimate family. It is a legitimate brotherhood that they all grew up together, so people understand those dynamics. Then you mix Kevin and I who may as well be family, 20 years of brotherhood and all that kind of thing, so without him, it didn’t work. I know he wasn’t the main player throughout the whole thing, but the fact that he was woven in carefully at the right times is what always propelled the story to the next level. It’s all because it’s a real situation.”
“Even if you don’t know about our 20-year history and you’re just a WWE fan, you still know our history dating back to NXT in 2015 and all that stuff. Of course that heightened everything. That heightened the success of the storyline, but it also obviously heightened how special it was to main event WrestleMania together in a match that really there was no precedent for because the idea of a tag team title match main-eventing WrestleMania, even a few years ago, you never would have dreamed of that. So I think that’s one of the other things that I’m quite proud of. I’m sure I speak for everyone involved in that match. It’s rare in WWE to still be coming out with firsts. The first time ever of blank, or the biggest blank, of whatever of all time, we managed to kind of do that, so that’s really something to be proud of, I think, in addition to everything else.”
If he had the patience to wait for the storyline to play out:
“Trusting the process and patience are almost two different things in this case because it wasn’t a matter of impatience as to, ‘Let’s just get the story where it needs to be already.” It wasn’t that. It was more about, okay, we have a general idea of where we want it to go or how we wanted to get there. If I had any stress throughout, which I did because you’re always trying to make everything as good as possible and that can be stressful. So for me, it was more about trying to keep it on track at times. In a world where you’re constantly flying by the seat of your pants, trying to keep things on track to the best of your abilities, and again, I’m still just a talent here. I have ideas and I weigh in a little bit, but there’s so much that’s beyond my control. I’d say if there were any sort of, I don’t want to call them anxieties, but stressors or whatever you want to call it, it was more about trying to see your vision through or see the vision through than it was about patience in waiting for something to happen. I think letting it play out was almost a better approach because I had trust that if it played out accordingly, it would get us to the next step. I don’t know. That’s kind of how I feel about it.”
If any of the upper brass thought his inclusion in the Bloodline storyline would be a bad idea when it was first proposed:
“Yeah, there were and I can’t mention names (he laughs). There were doubts as to whether it should even happen I think, even in its early infancy stage of it all. So for me, actually going back to a question you asked earlier about impatience, there was a point when I was actually very impatient with the storyline and I was almost ready to abandon ship and just say, ‘Okay, we need to start moving on in a different direction if this isn’t gonna go where it needs to go’, because for me, the whole thing, it all hinged on me and Roman getting together finally and the swerve being like, ‘Oh, Roman likes this guy.’ You expect him to not like him, but then he meets him and he likes him. That’s the money of the whole thing is that he buys in. Roman drives the whole story. It works very well even if he’s not there, but because he’s the main antagonist, his decision at the next point in the story is going to drive and propel the story in whatever direction it’s going, so you need him involved.”
Regarding bringing back and attracting new viewers for the Bloodline storyline:
“Like I said earlier, even if I were to say something like that, sure it could come off arrogant or bias or whatever it is, but I have every metric available to us backing up that sentiment which is numbers ranging from social media engagements, viewership, live attendance merchandise and just in general. The amount I’ve been bombarded on the streets versus before the storyline after the storyline. Obviously, I was in a more prominent position, but the amount of people who’ve even told me, ‘You know, I kind of fell out of love with the product for a while. I kind of stopped watching and this storyline is what brought me back in’, which is one of the most rewarding things you could possibly hear from a fan. So I do think we stumbled on something kind of magical, kind of lightning in a bottle, and the fact that we were able to draw it out for over a year and that it’s still kind of going on, I think it’s next evolution.”
You can check out the complete podcast below:
(h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription)
