Dolph Ziggler Pays Tribute To Zack Ryder, Curt Hawkins During SmackDown

Several WWE talents received their release on Wednesday, and two of the names on that list were former WWE Tag Team Champions Zack Ryder and Curt Hawkins. As any listener of the Major Wrestling Figure Podcast can tell you, Ziggler is a close friend of both men. Therefore, it wasn’t a surprise that Ziggler would want to do something to honor his friends, and that something happened during SmackDown on Friday night when Ziggler wore a Ryder and Hawkins t-shirt to the ring.

Ziggler came out following a very good promo segment between Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville where Deville explained why she took the path she did recently in regards to the storyline with Otis. After an argument ensued, out came Ziggler wearing a sport coat with the shirt visible underneath. This eventually gave way to a brawl that Otis came out for as well. Ziggler took off the coat during the fight, making the shirt even more visible.

Though not featured prominently on television in quite some time, the release of Ryder and Hawkins was somewhat surprising given their dedicated fan following. Due to the success of their podcast and general likability factor to the audience, the duo remained incredibly over in an organic way with the crowd. When given a spot on television, they always received a great reaction, and the pair even won the tag team titles at WrestleMania just last year.

While no wrestling companies are active right now due to the coronavirus pandemic, we’d expect both men to find employment in very short order once live wrestling returns. In the mean time, Hawkins owns a wrestling school and both men have their successful podcast and YouTube channel to fall back on.