ARN
04/21/20
EXTREME RULES 2015
Arn talking about Cesaro: “The fact is, Cesaro, had he been allowed to continue doing all those things only he can do, because as time wore on, is not a favorite guy, as you know, of the front office. For whatever reason that is, they are the only reason that is, they are the only ones that know because everybody else across the planet seems to think he is a superstar. But, he continued to get leaned on to stop doing all that stuff as a heel because it was too flashy.
When you can do things that no one else on the planet can do, why wouldn’t you bring that to our audience? Aren’t you cheating our audience by not giving it to them? In that more of that, I don’t give a s*** what the audience thinks, you are going to do what I want and you get more of that mentality? Ok, it gets sickening when you lived it for years and years and years and seen different characters just get pummeled and squashed because I said so.”
Arn talking about Dolph Ziggler: “Dolph has a set and he doesn’t mind saying what he thinks. Even though he is right most of the time, that’s the wrong thing to do. The reality is the company wants blind devotion. Dolph had an opinion for the longest time 10 years ago. It was the fact that Dolph, who throws a hell of a superkick, the office did not want him using the superkick because that was Shawn’s finish, but Shawn was retired. Shawn was gone. You can’t retire moves. How many super kicks do you see today for God’s sakes? Probably one in every single match, in every company. That was a heated issue years ago. But Dolph had an opinion. He would voice it.
The guy was never a question amongst all the producers. He worked his a** off and once we got to gorilla, no matter if he agreed with what was going on or not, he would go out and give you 100%. I’m a big fan of Dolph Ziggler. I think he is one of those guys you may b**** about him when he is on the card. I’m sure a lot of guys, the higher ups in the office, and certainly the boss got tired of dealing with Dolph. But, the fact of the matter is, Dolph is right a lot of the time. He’s been one of those performers that over the years, made everybody better than what they were.
The question as to why he was not one of the top guys, I certainly don’t have it. It wouldn’t have bothered me at all. The reality is, and mark my words, but I got a feeling Dolph is frugal. I have a feeling he made some investments. He is smart. One day he will say, oh you want to give me more s*** about something else. You know what? See ya. He will thump down the steps, take off his boots, walk out the door and you will never hear from him again. He will have accomplished what he wanted to in the business, left on his own terms.”
The full episode is available at this link.