Sami Zayn is now a two-time WWE Champion and is scheduled to face World Heavyweight Champion Roman Reigns for the 2026 Men's Crown Jewel Championship next month, but it was just earlier this year when Zayn thought he had missed his shot at these kinds of career milestones.

He shocked the world when he pinned Cody Rhodes at Night of Champions back in June to finally win the big one, and then he did it again when he knocked off CM Punk on the September 11 edition of Friday Night SmackDown to win the gold for a second time and solidify his positioning in the main event scene.

Those two victories were the culmination of a 10-year journey to finally hoist the company's top prize, which included multiple close calls. The most notable of which came at Elimination Chamber 2023 in Montreal, when he challenged Roman Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Championship.

Zayn lost that match, despite a groundswell of support from the WWE Universe for him to get his moment just weeks ahead of WrestleMania 39.

While appearing on the latest episode of Insight with Chris Van Vliet, Sami said that, at the time, he believed a case could have been made for a shock title change that would have drastically changed the card for WWE's biggest show of the year.

"I don’t think it’s ludicrous to say I should have. If you were watching at that time, I think anybody could have made that argument. But it was just again, timing, and Cody was also red hot at that time, and they were building to something. Then it leads to Cody the next year, and then it’s more gratifying... Would it have worked? I think so. But who’s to say?” Zayn told CVV.

Sami Zayn thought his title window had closed earlier this year

Fast-forward to the Royal Rumble this year, and Sami Zayn was once again competing for the WWE Championship against Drew McIntyre. The Scottish Warrior won the match decisively, and the defeat left Zayn believing the ship had sailed on his chance to complete his rise from ultimate underdog to the top of the WWE mountain.

“The Cinderella story, underdog who finally wins the big one, we burnt that card. That card was done after losing to Drew [McIntyre], because you can only tell that story so many times. You can get them on board once, twice, three times, and it wasn’t the right time. It wasn’t. I didn’t have the momentum that I had a year or two prior to that. But I had to kind of struggle to accept that maybe I just missed the window, slipped through the cracks, and it just won’t happen.”

Zayn said there was still a thought in the back of his mind that maybe he could win the title in a different way, which did end up happening several months later, but Sami indicated that he would have been at peace had those WWE Title aspirations never come to fruition.

“I’ve had a tremendous career, and winning the world title at that point is just the cherry on top," Sami said. "You don’t live and die by these things. You kind of just got to look at the big picture.”