7 Ups And 8 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Sept 5)

2. Zayn Hampered

At some point in the near future, Sami Zayn is going to have to either take a week off to “heal” his “injured” ankle or stop selling that he hurt it a couple weeks back. Longstanding, lingering (and kayfabe) injuries like this are great excuses for a wrestler to lose the occasional match. It gives a wrestler an out for losing and is believable because it’s consistent from previous weeks.

But that sort of thing only lasts for so long before it gets old and fans tire of a guy losing because of a bum leg or bad back. So yeah, Sami losing to Kevin Owens after he reinjured his ankles and crumpling while trying to deliver a Helluva Kick was a solid ending, but it can’t happen week after week.

All that said, Zayn and Owens absolutely should fight forever. Those two managed to make their matches interesting no matter how often they’ve wrestled. Sami acknowledging that despite defeating KO at Battleground, his career has stalled and he’s been directionless was a great dose of self-awareness.

Now, even though he lost, let’s see if Sami actually gets some direction, or if the writers were simply acknowledging the problem without bothering to fix it.