Dolph Ziggler Talks Life In WWE, Stand Up Comedy, And Performs Some Light Rock On T&R
BOSTON (CBS) - WWE superstar Dolph Ziggler is in town Tuesday for Smackdown at the TD Garden, so he came in studio with 98.5 The Sports Hub's Toucher & Rich show to preview the event in an all-encompassing interview about his wrestling career, dating Amy Schumer and his side job as a stand up comic.
Old school wrestlers have criticized this new generation of performers for not having the same sense of camaraderie that was present in their hey day.
Ziggler admits they might be partly correct, but went on to explain how the fellowship and respect among wrestlers nowadays is far more evident than in years past.
"I think a long time ago it was guys only looking out for themselves, getting stabbed in the back and stepped over. Now it's more of a group family trying to produce an amazing WWE show. That camaraderie is there.
"But when it comes to me, sometimes I travel with a small handful of people or by myself. And after a crazy show I'll do an awesome workout in the gym, do a four hour drive somewhere and just wanna crash in silence and not wanna see anybody for a couple hours."
Ziggler expounded even further on his hectic work schedule by describing the day-to-day life of an average WWE wrestler.
"If I didn't have media this morning I'd be working out. We were in Brooklyn last night for sold out Monday Night Raw and we were done at 11:30pm. We were on the road by 12 and maybe got here at like 3, 4 o' clock. I had a 6am wake up to do some media for a couple hours. I'll maybe catch a one hour nap, probably not. I'll get into work. We're always there way ahead of time and have the whole day to prepare, find a gym, workout and we'll be at the arena all night until Smackdown is over. It's a very busy day one way or another.
"The schedule never ends. There's no offseason. There's no breaks. It's great. It's nonstop and it's a little exhausting, but we are nonstop doing over 300 live events a year. We're always reaching out to another country. We're expanding globally everywhere.
"The fans keep coming out to support us so we add shows whenever we get a chance. That's why we're so busy. The outreach goes out to kids, families, grown ups. We have a great family show that we're very proud of. It's a little different than the era a few years ago. You can bring grandma and grandpa, so we're able to keep constantly adding shows and every year we do a few more."
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When Ziggler does get some downtime (hard to believe after reading the last few paragraphs, right?) he frequents local establishments with his friends and family, which doesn't stop the townie tough guy from challenging him to a fight every now and again.
The number one reason this occurs? "Probably because his girlfriend was looking at me instead of him," Ziggler joked.
There's Dolph Ziggler in the ring, and then there's his separate personal life. In his spare time Ziggler doubles as a stand up comic - in fact, he's even dated comedian Amy Schumer.
There was a sell out crowd of over 80,000 people the first time he did Wrestlemania, but it's the small, open mic nights at the comedy club that get him nervous the most.
Schumer went on the Howard Stern show and opened up about their sex life, which Ziggler didn't mind because it showed him in a positive light.
"It was fine. I didn't care because it was mostly talking about how great I was. It was more being fun and a little complimentary. It was just weird that my mom was like, 'What does this mean?' and I was just like 'Ughhhhh.'"
Ziggler closed the interview by previewing Wrestlemania, which is just two weeks away.
"Now is the best time of the year to be a wrestling fan."
He also performed Miley Cyrus and Air Supply in character - listen below to see how he did!
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