Jerry Lawler On How Much WWE Plans Ahead, If He Really Blames Dolph Ziggler Match For Cardiac Arrest
WWE Hall Of Famer Jerry 'The King' Lawler was recently a guest on the Cerrito Live Podcast. During the interview, Lawler talked about the "open-ended" nature of his new WWE contract and honestly believing that Dolph Ziggler's elbow drops caused his cardiac arrest back in 2012.
According to Lawler, his new WWE contract is "open-ended" as far as the work that he will be doing and much of that has to do with uncertain nature of WWE. By way of example, 'The King' shared that he did not know about his King's Court appearance on SmackDown Live until the week before.
"That's the cool thing about this contract. It's kind of an open-ended thing as far as what I'm actually going to be doing. That's the thing about the WWE. A lot of people? the great thing about it is that it's so spontaneous. I mean, they don't know, from one week to the next, what they're going to do, so it's hard to say, 'oh, here's what we've got planned for this far in advance' because, literally, the thing about me being on SmackDown, just came about like the week before or right after they did the SmackDown the week before.
"What happens is, I guess they all get together, the creative's crew and everything, and the writers. And they say, 'oh, next week, we're in Memphis – lets do something with 'King', so that's how stuff like that happens. I really don't know exactly what I'll be doing. I thought for awhile, 'hey, I wouldn't be doing any calling of matches' and then, all of a sudden, I'm calling the Royal Rumble [match], so you just don't know."
Lawler claimed that he honestly believes that Ziggler's aptly named 'Heart Stopper' elbow drops caused the cardiac arrest. Moreover, Lawler recalled thinking that Ziggler was killing him with those elbow drops in a tag match where Lawler teamed with Randy Orton to face Ziggler and CM Punk, which is in the video above.
"Oh my gosh, I've said it a million times. I really feel like that that match with Dolph Ziggler led to the cardiac arrest. I honestly believe that."
Lawler continued, "I remember so distinctly the main thing that I remember about that night, I don't remember the cardia arrest or anything, but I remember being back over at the desk and I remember looking up. I see Kane and Daniel Bryan in a match and then, the next thing I know, I open my eyes again and I'm in a hospital bed. But I do remember, during the match, Dolph Ziggler was jumping as high in the air as he could and coming down with those big elbow drops across my chest and I think he did 10. I think he did 10 in a row. And I remember at about the number five, I just thought to myself, 'damn, whatever happened to the days where we'd do this and not kill each other?' That was my exact thought sitting there. I remember having that exact thought. I'm thinking, 'this freakin' guy is killing me with these things, right?' and sure enough, he did!"
Click here to listen to the show. If you use any of the quotes from this article, please credit Cerrito Live with an H/T to Wrestling INC for the transcription.
Source: Cerrito Live