WWE Hall of Famer Doesn't Believe Sami Zayn Will Be a Transitional Champion

Sami Zayn's first WWE Championship defense is coming much sooner than anticipated, and the ride or dies are concerned.

The Underdog from the Underground pulled off one of the more shocking world title victories in modern WWE history when he pinned Cody Rhodes at Night of Champions to capture the WWE Championship for the first time in his career.

Friday night on SmackDown, The American Nightmare defeated Jey Uso in the main event to earn himself a championship rematch and acting Blue Brand General Manager Adam Pearce booked that match to take place this coming Monday night on WWE Raw in Chicago, Illinois.

So why the concern? There's a couple of reasons for those who haven't been keeping up with the rumor mill. Potential spoilers ahead.

The first is that Monday night is expected to CM Punk's first televised appearance since the night after WrestleMania 42. The Wrestling Observer's Dave Meltzer has reported that the self-proclaimed Best in the World is set to return from his hiatus as a SmackDown Superstar, and as of a few weeks ago, was scheduled to challenge Cody Rhodes for the WWE Title at SummerSlam.

At the same time, WrestleVotes on Fightful Select reported this week that (as of July 1) the WWE marketing department had yet to receive instructions to update the key art for next month's Premium Live Event to show Sami Zayn as the WWE Champion.

This behind the scenes information, coupled with Adam Pearce's insistence that Cody Rhodes get his rematch this coming Monday night, could add up to Sami Zayn being what's called a transitional champion. One WWE Hall of Famer, however, isn't buying into that belief.

JBL expects Sami Zayn to have a longer WWE Title run than many are now expecting

Former WWE Champion and current English language broadcaster for Lucha Libre AAA, John Bradshaw Layfield, spoke on the Something to Wrestle Podcast and tried to talk some folks off the ledge when it comes to the prospects of Zayn losing the title any time soon.

“I think it’s a very weird discourse," JBL said. "You talk about the transitional champions like [Stan] Stasiak, who at one point they claimed was a mailman. I’m not sure if he was or not, but the term was always mailman back in the day. You put a championship on somebody to get it to somebody else."

Sami Zayn winning the WWE Championship just to drop it back to Cody Rhodes a week later would serve little purpose on paper, but we'd have to wait see what story unfolded coming off the loss before passing full judgment. That said, JBL doesn't believe that Zayn is losing the title any time soon.

SAMI ZAYN IS UNDISPUTED WWE CHAMPION!!!!!

A MIRACLE IN SAUDI ARABIA!!! pic.twitter.com/rtmYqWSgfw
— WWE (@WWE) June 27, 2026

"I think he’s the champion and they’re going to give him a shot. I think the championship is going to be held by Sami as long as the merit’s there. Not something of, ‘Okay, we’ve got to get this on somebody else so we can push our star going into the later part of the year.’ I don’t think that’s the case. Sami’s just the champion. Not a transitional champion. Not a mailman. I think Sami’s just the champion and he should be treated as such.”

There certainly is a large portion of the WWE Universe that hopes JBL knows what he's talking about in this instance. We'll all find out for sure after the holiday weekend.

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