Nic Nemeth Recalls Difficulties Of WWE PPVs With Longer Cards

Many things have changed between the recent eras of WWE, from the times of Vince McMahon and the WWE Network, to the reign of Paul "Triple H" Levesque as head of creative, and WWE's deal with ESPN. One of the biggest changes is the decrease in matches on premium live events, something former WWE star Nic Nemeth, once known as Dolph Ziggler, addressed following WWE Crown Jewel on "Busted Open Radio."

Nemeth said that he's still getting used to not having eight match cards. He explained that sometimes, when he was in WWE, matches would be cut down from 20 minutes, to around four or less.

"Sometimes they said, 'Hey, we gotta cut ya, because the Attitude Era guys went long. Can you get it done in 30 seconds?'" he explained. "Tons of pay-per-view built up matches, with months of a story. I've gone out there before, 'Hey, can you get it done in eight?'"

Nemeth said that you have to understand it and put your ego in check, even if there's a story involved. He talked about a time he and Kevin Owens had a match with months of build, and were originally meant to go 25 minutes, but the match was nearly cut from the card.

"I went to Vince, I said, 'Vince, we finally have a story here. You had me on a couple matches on pay-per-view, and they were cold,'" he explained. "'We got a story here. This went from 25 to zero. I can get this done in 90 seconds and have the story be finished. Can we f'ing do this, yes or no?' He thought about it for 10 seconds, he said, 'Go do it.'"

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "Busted Open Radio" and provide a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.