Is Jack Swagger his own worst enemy?
On paper, Jacob Hager appears to be the perfect man to be a WWE Superstar. From his start in wrestling at age five, his sport recruitment by University of Oklahoma, his college friendship with Jim Ross, to his 30 pins as an All American Wrestler, the most in a single season, in 2006, Hager looked destined for wrestling greatness when right after college graduation he turned down a job in finance, his chosen field, to accept a contract with WWE.
Hager graduated from college in May of 2006 and debuted in the ring under his real name in DSW only four months later. In August 2007, Hager was moved to FCW. While he was there, he had a gimmick of being undefeated, which lasted quite a while before ending on August 18, 2008 in a RAW dark match to William Regal. He followed that up with a loss to D’Lo Brown at a Smackdown dark match, and then lost the FCW Championship to Sheamus on September 18th, but by then had debuted with WWECW as Jack Swagger.
On September 9, 2008, Swagger debuted on ECW and beat a jobber, but then quickly proved himself to be a heel, feuding with Tommy Dreamer. Swagger started an undefeated streak in ECW. Only four months later, Swagger became #1 Contender for Matt Hardy’s ECW Championship, and defeated him for it. Swagger continued his winning streak until losing to Finlay in a non-title match on February 3, 2009. Swagger retained his ECW Championship against Hardy at the Royal Rumble, and against Finlay at No Way Out. Christian started coming after Swagger’s ECW Championship, finally ending Swagger’s 104-day reign at Backlash. Swagger tried to regain the ECW Championship twice, but was unable to do so before being traded to RAW on June 29, 2009. That was Swagger’s one ECW Championship reign.
Swagger’s debut on RAW was in a Three-On-One Gauntlet Match for Orton’s WWE Championship where he purposely got counted out to impress Orton. Swagger went on to feud with MVP, Kofi, and Miz, including being eliminated at the Royal Rumble by Kofi. Swagger went on to qualify and win the Money In The Bank Ladder Match at WrestleMania XXVI for any WWE World Championship over the following year.
His first attempt was against Cena on RAW after WrestleMania for his WWE Championship, but that never got off the ground and so Swagger ended up cashing in on the March 30 taping of Smackdown against Chris Jericho, the World Heavyweight Championship, after Edge had speared him. Swagger successfully defended his WHC against Jericho, Edge, Orton and Big Show, until he lost it on June 20 at the Fatal 4 Way PPV in a Fatal 4 Way Match against Rey Mysterio, CM Punk and Big Show. Rey defeated Swagger for the Title, and even after Swagger kept attacking Rey and trying to get the Title back, he never did. That was Swagger’s only MITBLM win, and his only WHC reign.
Swagger moved on to working with Michael Cole in his feud against Jerry ‘The King’ Lawler, culminating in Cole’s WrestleMania match with King, and Swagger’s stunner from Stone Cold Steve Austin. Swagger continued to bounce around and dabble with various other Superstars, but nothing big came from it, right up to Swagger losing the next MITBLM to Alberto Del Rio. Swagger decided that Vickie Guerrero should manage him as well as Dolph Ziggler, but that didn’t mean the two of them got along very well.
Swagger went after Ziggler’s United States Championship, but was unable to beat him for it. Vickie them put them together as a tag team, but they were unable to defeat Air Boom for the Tag Team Championships. After Ziggler lost the US Championship, Swagger was able to win it from Zack Ryder on the January 16, 2012 episode of RAW. Swagger and Ziggler kept trying to win the TTC, but were unable to do so. Swagger lost the US Championship on March 5 to Santino Marrella. Swagger and Ziggler kept arguing and fighting until Vickie decided they would have to fight to see who would remain under her charge. Ziggler defeated Swagger, so Vickie released him to be on his own. From that point, Swagger had a serious losing streak until he told then RAW GM AJ Lee that he was going to take some time off. This was Swagger’s one US Championship reign.