Sami Zayn says he’s hitting his stride right now, and he compared his current run to the height of Bret Hart‘s WWE career.
In recent months, Zayn has repeatedly been praised for his work as a member of The Bloodline, as he is widely viewed as one of the most entertaining acts on WWE TV. He also faced Johnny Knoxville in an unforgettable match at WWE WrestleMania 38.
Speaking on WWE After the Bell with Corey Graves, Zayn discussed his hot streak, including his WrestleMania match against Johnny Knoxville and his alliance with The Bloodline, and described how he’s hitting his stride 20 years into his career. He brought up Hart as a comparison by noting that, in his mind, “The Hitman”
“Those are two of my favorite things I’ve done in my career, honestly, and they’ve gone back to back,” Zayn said. “It is funny that this is 20 years into my wrestling career, and 10 years into my WWE career. It’s just funny to kind of be hitting my stride in a sense now. I used to look to Bret Hart for inspiration in many things when I was a kid, but the things I always found remarkable was I always thought Bret found his voice and his character really hit its peak in 1997.”
“He was 40, he was 20-plus years into the game. He was born into the business, and at 40, all of a sudden he starts hitting stride as a character. So I always looked at that and thought like oh, there’s really no time limit to when you really hit that part of your career. Bret was having great matches for example in the late 80s, early 90s and all this stuff. But as that kind of marquee performer and a marquee character, he has already won the title five times.”
Zayn also pointed to Roman Reigns as another example of a performer who is hitting his stride several years into his career, even after he had already main-evented WrestleMania multiple times and won several titles.
“Even Roman, you look at Roman, he had already main-evented five or six WrestleManias or whatever it is, and only now, we’re celebrating 10 years of his first match,” Zayn said. “Now these last two years, multiple-time champion, multiple-time WrestleMania main event, now we’re all talking pretty unanimously about these last two years, where he’s really hit his stride and become the guy.”
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