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While not 100% assured, Zangief could still lock his arms and prevent him from targeting properly.
Ryu and Ken use normal fire, although the former has shown to be able to incinerate a cyborg in seconds even with his standard blue hadokens, although in that case he was specifically going for the kill so idk if it's standard heat always.
Ken still goes for fire attacks and projectiles almost all the time, and the fire and electric hadokens are standard toolset for him.
Ryu's standard Hadokens can also be projected as streams of energy, although that was shown only once.
He also fights regularly with Laura, who uses electricity for almost all her techniques.
Zangief is also suggested to having had a rivalry with Blanka during Alpha, who also uses unspecified degrees of electricity, but of course enough to damage people.
That's sure, but he's got other options rather than just taking them head-first (although that's pretty in character).
He is still agile enough to jump very high and far, or can just dodge by moving, since he's not limited to a 2D plane.
Of course grappling isn't the end, but Zangief's vast array of techniques, LS, AP and skill/experience/whatever make them his best tool.
Given how he's had to work his way through projectiles users for all his career, I don't think a fire beam would set the game necessarily.
