Sami Zayn makes you believe.
There is one story that professional wrestling tells very well: that of the underdog versus the overwhelming favorite. Sami Zayn plays the plucky underdog as well as anyone. He's not as athletic as many of his opponents. He's not as dynamic or as strong. The odds are against him in many of his matches.
Sami Zayn overcomes those odds the only way underdogs know how: by competing with more heart and soul. So the story goes. And nobody delivers that story better than Sami Zayn.
On an episode of Monday Night Raw this past October, Zayn lost to Gunther, the current WWE World Heavyweight Champion. Nobody thought he would win. But for just a moment, he made the fans believe.
That's what he does. Sometimes, that leads to the improbable win, with Zayn shocking the world and winning as he did at last year's Wrestlemania (also against Gunther). More often, it results in a heartbreaking loss. But it's the moments of hope that matter. The moments, however fleeting, when Sami Zayn makes you believe.
Those moments stand on their own.
1. The entrance
Sami Zayn's entrance is a rallying cry.
Professional wrestlers have a lot at their disposal when it comes to eliciting a range of emotions in the first few seconds after they emerge from the tunnel. Excitement. Fear. Joy. Sadness. Boredom (hey, it can go wrong, too).
For Sami Zayn, the excitement happens right away. He marches out. The intro plays. He pumps his fist with the music as the fans chant.
"Let's go!"
Everything about his entrance music is excellent. The brass instruments blare. It's upbeat. It's easy to sing along. It gets the fans behind him just the way that it should for an underdog baby face.
The singing was actually pretty quiet on Monday. But the chant at the beginning didn't disappoint. This was the first moment when Sami Zayn made people believe.
2. The chop
If fans knew the odds for Sami Zayn going into his match with the imposing heavyweight champion, they were given a number of visual reminders throughout the affair. Gunther beat down Zayn again and again. Whatever Sami tried, Gunther had the answer.
These moments provide the building blocks for the story. In order for the babyface to overcome the impossible challenge in front of him, he needs to reach the verge of defeat.
If Sami Zayn is the master of making you believe in the underdog, Gunther is the master of making you believe that nobody could ever defeat him. To do that, he has a number of dynamic moves at his disposal. Of those moves, he's best known for his knife-edge chops to the chest.
Rightfully so.
3. The first kickout
"Somehow there are still fires burning in the challenger!"
- Wade Barrett
As these two reached the second half of their match, Sami Zayn mounted his comebacks. He used creativity in some battles on the floor outside the ring. He showed guts and savvy. At one point, he even had to break the referee's "10 count," meaning that Gunther would otherwise have been outside the ring for 10 seconds and declared the loser.
If that seems like a good thing, it's not. Sami needed to beat Gunther in the ring to win the championship.
So, the comeback continued after Zayn dragged Gunther up into the ring in pursuit of a proper victory. He hit one "helluva kick," a running boot to the head that he hits on his opponent in the corner. He went for another. Gunther interrupted him en route and blasted him with a clothesline.
Then Gunther power-bombed him. Then he pinned him. The match was supposed to be over.
Sami Zayn kicked out just before the ref counted three.
That's the second moment when Sami made people believe.
4. The second kickout
The beating continued. Gunther clobbered Zayn and threw him around some more. The underdog kept fighting back. He kept avoiding defeat, doing so with a couple clever maneuvers and a whole heaping amount of resilience.
Finally, it appeared that Gunther had finally crushed his opponent's iron will. As the crowd wildly chanted Sami's name, Gunther hit another clothesline and another power bomb. Finally, mercifully, the beatdown was over.
The ref started the count. And Sami Zayn kicked out in 1.
This was the third moment when Sami Zayn made people believe. He made Gunther believe, too.
So, you remember when we covered that part about the babyface suffering a lot of heartbreaking losses?
Shortly after Zayn kicked out in 1, Gunther choked him out with a sleeper hold. The struggle ensued for a few minutes, but the end had come. The champ saw what he had to do in order to stomp out this last little bit of life, this last gasp of hope.
The sleeper was locked in. He held on tight. Sami Zayn was finally defeated. It was abrupt, a swift response to remove the hope that had sizzled in the building just moments earlier.
In the end, that was the brilliance of it. Sami Zayn did it again. He made the fans believe. And then, as quickly as they had allowed for the possibility that the underdog would win, Gunther crushed those hopes.
It was brilliantly done, a story well told. It worked because of the moments that Zayn and Gunther created. It worked because Sami Zayn makes you believe.
Images from WWE YouTube
