10 Wrestlers Who Got A WrestleMania Singles Match Before Dolph Ziggler

1. Kofi Kingston

Fandango WrestleMania 29
WWE.com

"It should have been me" was Dolph Ziggler's relentless drone during the 2019 programme between 'The Show Off' and Kofi Kingston after the latter won the WWE Championship in an emotional and evocative match against Daniel Bryan.

The win was a multi-layered celebration of a history-making moment that played upon a number of the endless mountains Kingston had been forced to climb to reach a single summit. Included amongst them was the systemic failure to elevate midcarders for the better part of a decade. For several years, Kingston and Ziggler were held up as the biggest examples of the broken machine.

They worked and worked and worked (often against each other...really often against each other) whilst others took spots on major shows as per the whims of Vince McMahon. It should have been them, and eventually it finally was Kofi, but Ziggler barely ever made it into the conversation when the Road To WrestleMania beckoned.

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Contributor

Michael is a writer, editor, podcaster and presenter for WhatCulture Wrestling, and has been with the organisation nearly 8 years. He primarily produces written, audio and video content on WWE and AEW, but also provides knowledge and insights on all aspects of the wrestling industry thanks to a passion for it dating back over 35 years. As one third of "The Dadley Boyz" Michael has contributed to the huge rise in popularity of the WhatCulture Wrestling Podcast and its accompanying YouTube channel, earning it top spot in the UK's wrestling podcast charts with well over 62,000,000 total downloads. He has been featured as a wrestling analyst for the Tampa Bay Times, GRAPPL, GCP, Poisonrana and Sports Guys Talking Wrestling, and has covered milestone events in New York, Dallas, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, London and Cardiff. Michael's background in media stretches beyond wrestling coverage, with a degree in Journalism from the University Of Sunderland (2:1) and a series of published articles in sports, music and culture magazines The Crack, A Love Supreme and Pilot. When not offering his voice up for daily wrestling podcasts, he can be found losing it singing far too loud watching his favourite bands play live. Follow him on X/Twitter - @MichaelHamflett