after some time away from tv, ziggler returned on the august 22 edition of "smackdown live" to declare that he would undergo a gimmick change on the following week's edition. he later started mocking, week after week, the entrances of current and former wrestlers such as john cena, naomi, shawn michaels and randy savage. ziggler believed that fans only cared about elaborated entrances, and not about the in-ring performances, where he claimed he was the best. however, after mocking the undertaker's entrance, ziggler was interrupted by bobby roode, who challenged ziggler to a match at hell in a cell, which ziggler accepted. at the event, ziggler seemed to enter with his usual music and titantron graphics, but the music was scratched off and the graphics turned off, and he simply entered with no music or titantron (like a wrestler in the 1980s or prior). he was then defeated by roode, who pinned him while holding his tights. right after that, ziggler attacked roode from behind with a "zig zag". on the october 17 edition of "smackdown live", ziggler defeated roode in a rematch by pinfall while holding his tights, similar to how roode defeated him. on the october 31 edition of "smackdown", ziggler failed to earn a spot on team smackdown for the survivor series five-on-five elimination match against "raw" after being defeated by roode in a two-out-of-three falls match. ziggler was involved in a verbal backstage confrontation with both roode and united states champion baron corbin on the december 5 episode of "smackdown", where roode defeated corbin via disqualification after being attacked by ziggler. the following week, roode interfered in a match between ziggler and corbin in similar fashion, resulting in a disqualification victory for ziggler. at clash of champions, ziggler defeated corbin and roode in a triple threat match to win his second united states championship. on the following episode of "smackdown" on december 19, ziggler held a celebration that was a retrospective of his wwe career; he said that the fans did not deserve him and placed the title belt in the ring before leaving. a week later, general manager daniel bryan said that ziggler was nowhere to be found and had indeed vacated his title, so that a tournament to crown a new champion would be held (which was won by bobby roode).