13 Things We Learned From Dark Side Of The Ring: Zach Gowen
5. “I Was A Complete A**hole”
...yep, this.
Zach freely admits that he was unbearable during his WWE run. The sudden stardom went to his head, and it didn't go unnoticed by his new peers. On 'Dark Side', Rhyno said: “I didn’t think someone could be that f***ing dumb”. Acknowledging how reckless he was, Gowen added: “The perks of being a TV star at 19. Free drinks, fast women and free pills”.
Rhyno then recalled seeing Zach being knocked back by a bar who didn’t believe he was 21. They were right, of course, but Gowen said he was a WWE superstar on TV. The other wrestlers just rolled their eyes, because it was embarrassing to witness someone trying to big league his way in despite being such a newbie.
Meanwhile, Zach thought that kind of arrogance came with the territory, so he was pretending to be some super-confident star when inside he was anything but. It was all projection, but the fame and instant attention from people (especially women) went straight to his head. That'd explain why he thought it was perfectly normal to dictate to Big Show, Kurt Angle and others what they'd be doing in their own matches.
Things didn't get any better for Gowen. It's unclear if anyone in a position of power or a senior wrestler in the locker room had a word in his ear, or if they simply let him dig his own grave with the roster/office. Whatever the case, things were about to go from bad to worse for the newbie.