What If Dolph Ziggler Didn’t Lose The World Title?

In the latest “What If”, I take a look at Dolph Ziggler’s World Heavyweight Championship reign in 2013. On Monday, I published part one of this Ziggler scenario. In it, I altered the past as if I was the creative writer in WWE. Ziggler did not lose his World Title to Alberto Del Rio at Payback 2013. Ziggler’s title reign would last until SummerSlam, where two people won the World Title that night.

The following night on Raw, Barrett is in the ring celebrating winning his first World Title. Christian comes out says he respects Barrett and that if he had a MITB contract, he would’ve cashed it in last night, too. But Barrett ruined his opportunity to be the World Champion he wants to be. Christian tells Barrett he wants his rematch at Night of Champions. This prompts Ziggler to interrupt and say that he also wants his rematch. As one could guess, a triple threat match is announced for Night of Champions. Barrett goes on to retain after pinning Christian.

Barrett goes on to hold the World Title for awhile. Ziggler stays in the upper midcard and works plenty of main-event matches on both Raw and SmackDown over the next few months, but there isn’t a clear direction for where Ziggler is going. Fans are worried that the Show-Off is slipping back to the midcard scene. January rolls around and the Road to WrestleMania has arrived. Ziggler suffers another concussion during a match against Ryback on Superstars. This is a huge disappointment to many fans.

Royal Rumble takes place at the end of January. And now it’s time for the Royal Rumble match. #27 is about to enter. Everyone is speculating who’s left when Dolph Ziggler’s theme song goes off and the crowd explodes. Ziggler runs down and quickly eliminates Sheamus. Batista, Big E Langston, and Rey Mysterio are the last to enter. Rey is tossed out. It is down to Reigns, Batista, Ziggler, and Big E. Ziggler eliminates his former friend, Big E. Reigns is tossed out by Batista. Ziggler taunts the crowd and Batista runs after the distracted superstar. Ziggler turns around and quickly ducks while pulling down the top rope, allowing Batista to go over. Dolph Ziggler wins the Royal Rumble!

What changed: Ziggler never lost the World Heavyweight Championship at Payback 2013. He went on to feud with Christian and Wade Barrett during the summer. A major thing that did not happen was the fact that the WWE and World Titles weren’t unified at TLC. Dolph Ziggler won the 2014 Royal Rumble Match and will now headline WrestleMania 30. He gets a big push throughout 2013 and 2014 and doesn’t float around with nothing major happening, like his current situation. Wade Barrett wins the WHC MITB Contract match instead of Damien Sandow.

What did not change: Dolph Ziggler unfortunately suffered two concussions within a year’s time. Of course if I could change that, I would. But Ziggler is able to rebound from those injuries and stay on top, in this situation. Christian gets a World Title match at SummerSlam. Ziggler returns during the Royal Rumble match.

There are several ways you can go in this case. Who holds the World Title? Who wins MITB? What matches take place at the pay-per-views? How do you book those matches? What’s the long term plan? It can be very challenging to write these type of articles, but it’s awesome to play the role of a creative writer.

Dolph Ziggler is a very talented wrestler and deserves this kind of push. Which title does he choose to challenge for at WrestleMania? That’s for you to decide! Sound off below on your predictions for his future and what you thought about this scenario I came up with for Ziggler. What would you change? What would you keep the same?