Sami Zayn has clarified recent comments that surfaced online regarding a high-profile victory.
On the March 11th WWE Raw, Zayn was the last man standing in a gauntlet match to crown a new number one contender to Gunther’s Intercontinental Championship. Following the victory, some fans believed that this was not the best choice of challenger for The Ring General as Chad Gable had previous history with Gunther and was one of many stars looking to finish the story in Philadelphia.
Following the victory, Booker T revealed on his podcast that Sami Zayn told him that he was legitimately upset following the victory as he didn’t expect that reaction from the fans:
“[Sami Zayn] was so literally upset about the online heat that he got from the fans. He’s like, ‘Man, I thought the fans love me. And then next thing you know, I see all this stuff.’ I say, ‘Man, you can’t listen to that white noise. You gotta think about how great that match was, and you’re gonna look back on it one day and say: ‘Man, that was some really, really good work that I did.’ But he still, like I said, was feeling that heat. He let someone down just because the fans didn’t think the match was as good as, you know. I thought it was.”
Speaking with Josh Martinez on the Superstar Crossover podcast, Zayn addressed the comments made by Booker T and his thoughts on the match result:
“Well, I was a little surprised to read that. Because I basically bumped into Booker on the plane and we were just sitting next to each other. So, we’re just talking. It’s pretty weird to see that on the internet. All this to say, No, I was very happy with the performance, because he was talking about the performance itself, the match itself. I was like, ‘Yeah, I was very pleased with the match. It’s just unfortunate that it felt like the reaction to the wind itself was a little split, if not a little more skewed towards Chad’ because we did a great job of building Chad and he’s done a great job of building himself,” Sami admits.
“When you’re a good guy or whatever, or bad guy, and you know where you’re headed, you just want the full investment, right? You want the full scope of the audience’s emotional investment. I felt like this was an interesting story because it splits the emotional investment in two. So, you’re only getting 50% of the pie, right? That’s just an interesting dynamic because it makes it more compelling.”
Zayn continued, stating that although he understands the fans’ feelings due to their support to Gable, he was let down that he didn’t receive the same feeling:
“For sure, as a guy whose job it is to rally the entire audience behind him. Which is what I sometimes feel like my job is as a good guy. I was a little let down that I felt like I couldn’t get the entire audience to rally behind me. At least, that’s not even entirely true,” he continued. “During the match itself, it feels like they’re very happy and invested in the whole thing.
But the online backlash the day after, just with people feeling a little disappointed for Chad, which is very understandable. It just was a little deflating, you know? But again, this is just something I was kind of articulating to him as to just kind of shoot the breeze on the plane. So I think maybe once it gets out online, it seems like a bigger deal than it is. That’s all I was articulating to him.”
Sami Zayn Looks Back On Landmark WWE Defeat
March 2023 saw Zayn compete in one of the biggest matches of his career as he challenged Roman Reigns for the Undisputed Championship in Montreal. Unfortunately for Zayn and the fans in attendance, Zayn became another Superstar who was unable to dethrone The Tribal Chief. Looking back on the loss, Sami Zayn admitted that a win over Roman Reigns would have been a storybook ending.
H/t to Fightful.