In recent memory of the WWE, we have not seen a weird situation like this where a superstar gets crowned with a much-deserved title and then vacates it without no reason, whatsoever.
It is a shocking thing to see at a point when this title could have saved his career.
The concerned superstar is none other than Dolph Ziggler who won the US title at the triple threat match in Clash of Champions PPV event. He was added to the contest between Bobby Roode and Baron Corbin to make things interesting. To the shock of the world, he was able to connect with the Zig-Zag, out of nowhere to win the championship. It was his second-ever US title win.
His win was appreciated a lot by the WWE fans to an extent. On Smackdown, the Newark crowd chanted, “you deserve it”, thoroughly for this big win.
However, he intended to care the least about them and decided to turn his back. What was interesting was that he left his title in the middle of the ring indicating that he might be leaving his championship on the show.
In light of @HEELZiggler‘s apparent decision to voluntarily relinquish the #USTitle, #SDLive GM @WWEDanielBryan announces a TOURNAMENT to crown the next titleholder! pic.twitter.com/xB4CKU4cGf
— WWE (@WWE) December 27, 2017
Daniel Bryan confirmed that Dolph Ziggler might have vacated the prestigious title, last week. So, we will be crowning a new champion shortly. He announced a tournament that will be hosted in the weeks to follow on Smackdown Live. Furthermore, WWE.com confirmed that the knockout series would continue in the New Year special edition of the show, next week,
“After Dolph Ziggler seemingly “voluntarily relinquished” the United States Championship just two days after winning it at WWE Clash of Champions, the title’s future has come into focus. On the Dec. 26 edition of SmackDown LIVE, General Manager Daniel Bryan revealed that the next champion would be determined via an Eight-Superstar tournament featuring some of Team Blue’s biggest names.
Who will take hold of the star-spangled championship? Tune into SmackDown LIVE every Tuesday at 8/7 C on USA Network to find out!”
EXCLUSIVE: @JinderMahal revels in his victory over @WWEDillinger and reveals what he has planned for the #USTitle! #SDLive @SinghBrosWWE pic.twitter.com/1TMqYIFigr
— WWE (@WWE) December 27, 2017
The first round matches were as follows:
Bobby Roode def. Baron Corbin
Jinder Mahal def. Tye Dillinger
Bobby Roode won the first schedule against Corbin, whereas, Jinder Mahal picked up the win against Dillinger to advance to the Semi-Finale of the tournament. We expect to see some major names from Smackdown like Nakamura, Randy Orton, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn and more to participate in this contest starting from next week. Hopefully, we will have a new champion by the time of Royal Rumble.