Dolph Ziggler Says He Begged And Pleaded For WWE To Take Him Off TV

Dolph Ziggler surprised fans when he won the United States Title at Clash of Champions, and then vacated the belt on the following episode of SmackDown Live. Ziggler left the belt in the ring, walked away, and then left fans with quite a few questions after he disappeared from WWE programming.

It seemed that Dolph was being set up for a big angle, but he later returned during the Royal Rumble match, and his absence was never really explained.

Ziggler was only off TV for a few weeks, but during a recent appearance on the All Things Wrestling Radio podcast, the former WWE World Heavyweight Champion said he begged to be taken off TV for several months.

“I will say that I really begged and pleaded for a couple months off the television show, because no matter how good I am or what I’m up to, it seems that 99 times out of 100, I would lose. I didn’t think that I deserved to be on the TV show if I was someone that was losing every night, so I asked to be taken off. I was hoping for maybe six months or a year, and it ended up being four weeks.”

In the end Dolph obviously didn’t get what he wanted, but he is fighting in a WWE Championship match at Fastlane on Sunday, so that’s better than nothing.