You all know of Ric Flair, right? One of the greatest wrestlers to ever set foot in a ring; a sixteen time world champion; the one time sixty-minute man, who went for an hour or more back in the 80’s with the best in the business. The living legend who inspired a whole host of future greats like Shawn Michaels and Triple H. “The Man”, as they all call him. And we all know that he was past his prime by the time the 1990’s drew to a close. He was in his early fifties, and should have just hung up his boots and walked away at that time, just like several of his peers all ready had, except perhaps Hulk Hogan.
But he couldn’t.
He left the WCW and came back to the WWE for one last run. He was an old man who was nothing more than a joke; he was just a jobber, used to put other younger talent over - like Randy Orton, and the rest of the locker room. It was embarrassing to see him just get beaten time and time again. It was humiliating to see this once great god of wrestling age before us, skin hanging off his body, hair receding, decomposing right before our very eyes.
He had his “last” match at Wrestlemania 24 against Shawn Michaels - who as a kid, worshipped Flair. Ric, win or lose, vowed to retire after that night. It was supposed to be his last match.
But it wasn’t. We all expected Ric to fall back on something, like real estate – or so the rumours and speculation claimed.
But he didn’t. He went over to TNA, the successor to the old WCW, and continued to get involved, even wrestling in matches. He’s suffered from injuries – having undergone surgery recently for a torn rotator cuff.
He still hasn’t quit the business, and I’m wondering if he ever will.
But then look at Shawn Michaels. Shawn Michaels was inspired by Ric Flair. He wanted to be the Flair of the 1990’s. Ric was his boyhood idol. Shawn might have patterned a lot of his career after the man - but he knew when to quit. He’s done it twice. The show stopped for good at Wrestlemania 26, two years after he’d “retired” Flair at WM 24. His last match was with The Undertaker – and these two have a storied history. The two of them wrestled in the first ever Hell in a Cell match in 1997. It was this man who made Shawn retire back in 1998 after WM 14, due to a spinal injury he’d suffered the year prior - costing him four years of his career. And he in turn ended Shawn’s career for good in 2010, twelve years later.
The difference is that although Shawn has come back to the WWE for various angles, he doesn’t wrestle. He’ll talk on the mic, he might even execute sweet chin music on someone. But he doesn’t cross the line, and get in the ring to wrestle. The truth is that Shawn’s body has never been the same since the casket match in 1997. His back has been bothering him for years, and they say his body’s been falling apart for a long time.
And he of all people should know that when you’re over forty, not only do the injuries take longer to come back from – but the old ones come back to haunt you too. Shawn retired at 44 years of age. Some claim that it was premature. But Ric is still wrestling at 61. Where is the line, exactly, between young and old?
Then there’s the tragic case of Stone Cold Steve Austin, who retired in 2003, at the not-so-old age of 38. We all know the story behind Austin. How he suffered a neck injury at the hands of the long deceased Owen Hart, also back in 1997, which left him with a debilitating condition known as “Spinal Shock Syndrome”. Steve was in his early thirties when this happened.
He hung it out as long as he could, though. We saw Steve come to the ring with big metal knee braces on, that looked like he borrowed them from Forrest Gump. His body, too, was falling apart. Injuries to the spine often do this. Ask Kurt Angle, who broke his neck 15 years ago. He still feels the pain, and is fuelled by painkillers every day of his life, last I heard.
Then once again, in 2003 at Wrestlemania, Austin had his last match. Not only is Wrestlemania the grandest stage of them all; the place where stars are born - it’s where wrestlers come to lay their careers to rest too, usually for good – but not always, it seems. The Rock himself had his “last match” there too, before going off to Hollywood, only coming back a year later at WM, and then again 7 years after that. He seems set to stay… in between movies anyway.
Flair broke the unwritten rule of not wrestling after a final match at WM, and it was an insult to many, especially Shawn Michaels.
Recently, Edge retired. “What?” you ask, “But he’s so young!”
Edge also suffered a neck injury years ago, just after Austin retired, in 2003. He left the WWE for a year or more, and had surgery. He came back the following year, and went on to have a majorly successful run that lasted for about 7 years, in a way emulating Shawn Michael’s return to active competition in 2002, but with more title belts. But issues with Edge’s spine forced him to retire in 2011. The doctor’s advice was to stop, and just walk away. Edge had complained of numbness; lack of feeling in his arms and so on. Instead of dragging it out like several of the aforementioned names, Edge decided it was time. Edge is only 38, but he’s had a career that’s lasted over 15 years, nearly 20.
So yes, wrestlers who rose up in the 1990’s seem to be retiring earlier than their counterparts from the 1980’s and earlier. Soon, the likes of Triple H and even The Undertaker will follow in the footsteps of Shawn and Edge, and call it a day. For them, twenty years is probably just about enough. You can argue that a lot of these names mentioned were forced to retire due to injury. Maybe if they hadn’t sustained those injuries, they would still be in the ring today. But you forget that Ric Flair (yes, we’re coming back to him, now), broke his neck a long time ago too – and this was back in the 1970’s, before he became practically a household name, and a huge star in the wrestling business.
I think that stars of the attitude era were/are doing a whole hell of a lot more than the guys before them, who paved the way. There’s the tours, the WWE projects other than wrestling – mainly film. I think perhaps, that they burn out quicker than the fellas who were around during “the time”, during the big wrestling boom of that era.
The question is now, whether we’ll see that trend continue with the current, rising generation of wrestlers. Will they call it quits after twenty years; fifteen, or maybe only ten?
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