One of the worst-kept secrets in wrestling became headline news this week. After a 30 year career spanning multiple promotions and dozens of championships, The Man Called Sting has wrestled his final match. So says TMZ, which claims the official announcement could come from Sting himself as part of his WWE Hall of Fame acceptance speech in Dallas next month. And while he doesn’t get to go out on his own terms, he can take solace in the fact that few men have been able to enjoy the kind of charmed career he has had.
The writing was on the wall after his match with Seth Rollins last September at Night of Champions. One buckle bomb was bad enough, but two? The move looks brutal enough for a man half his age, but for Sting to go out there and willingly give up his body for two of them just seemed to be tempting fate. To his credit, on wobbly legs, he soldiered on to finish the rest of the match because that’s just what you do. He didn’t blame Rollins for what happened, and really, how could he? It wasn’t anyone’s fault. In fact, he later credited Rollins as being the best worker he had ever shared a ring with, which is pretty high praise coming from someone who has been in wars with the likes of Ric Flair, Vader and Kurt Angle.
With his neck all jacked up, he learned that he has cervical spinal stenosis, or a narrowing of the spinal canal. This can affect the nerves and result in great pain as time goes on. At the time, he indicated he would need neck surgery, but was hopeful that Night of Champions would not be the last image fans had of him inside the ring. Back in December, I made it pretty clear that I thought Sting was done, if for no other reason than the fact that spinal stenosis is the very thing that ended the careers of both Steve Austin and Edge. In the case of Edge, WWE made it clear that they would never medically clear him to wrestle, and he was “only” 37 years old at the time. Sting will turn 57 this weekend. It made little sense to think, and still does, that WWE would ever allow him to lace up his boots and step back through the ropes. This is just my opinion of course, but I believe this is more a case of WWE making the decision for Sting than Sting making it for himself. Were it entirely up to him, I think Sting would prefer to heal up and have one last match for closure, but ultimately, as hypersensitive as WWE is about these things today (concussions in particular), it wasn’t his call to make.
So, what now? The same TMZ report claims that sources close to Sting indicate he would be open to a non-wrestling role in WWE, but they have yet to pitch such a role to him. They could potentially offer up a scenario where Sting gives Shane McMahon the assist at Wrestlemania, looping back to the storyline where Shane “bought” WCW, and in turn, the next night on Raw, Shane could appoint Sting the new General Manager of Raw. The one drawback with that idea is that to have Sting cost Undertaker his match and NOT follow that up with some sort of confrontation between the two would likely leave a lot of fans feeling underwhelmed. Still, I think it merits some consideration because it would be nice to find a role for him on the show (not necessarily weekly) while also doing away with the overdone heel authority figure gimmick, at least for a while.
I can’t help but feel sad that Sting never got to have a real productive run in WWE. To think that his lone Wrestlemania appearance was in a losing effort to Triple H, even though Sting himself may have wanted it that way thinking it could be his final bout, it hardly seems like something loyal Sting fans had envisioned when he first came to WWE. Perhaps, as rumored, it was done as a way for Vince McMahon to put the final exclamation point on the WWE vs. WCW war once and for all, a war that apparently still exists only in his mind. Or maybe it was done with the idea of keeping Triple H strong for a Wrestlemania match this year against The Rock, also rumored before Rock’s filming schedule rendered such a match impossible. He earned two wins on Raw, one via disqualification against Big Show and one via submission in a tag match teaming with John Cena against Big Show and Seth Rollins. He followed that up with the loss to Rollins, so he goes down batting .500 with two wins and two losses. Yet I’m still glad he had his Wrestlemania moment. I’m glad he had the chance to wrestle on Raw. And I’m glad he finally got to wrestle for the WWE title. Not a bad way to go out.
I’ve spent nearly 15 straight weeks counting down the greatest WCW matches of all time on my podcast. Sting has appeared five different times on that list, and there’s a reason for that. Whether it was leading his own squadron against The Dangerous Alliance in War Games, battling Big Van Vader to determine the “King of Cable”, or challenging DDP for the WCW World title, Sting had a tendency to deliver in big matches. More than his work, I think most people will remember him for his loyalty. His loyalty as the avenger of WCW against the nWo and Hollywood Hogan. His loyalty to the promotion behind the scenes as well, never working a single day for Vince McMahon so long as WCW still had a breath in its body. That loyalty extended even to TNA and Dixie Carter, to whom he arguably gave the last great years of his career. It was that loyalty that cost us potential matches with The Undertaker, Shawn Michaels and Randy Orton, but at the same time, gave us matches with Kurt Angle, AJ Styles and Samoa Joe.
It’s not easy to “get over” in wrestling. It’s even harder to stay over. Sting has been a beloved figure for the majority of his 30+ years in the wrestling business. In a few short weeks, he will take his rightful place in the Hall of Fame. What his future holds beyond that date is still a question, but to steal a phrase, “the only thing that’s for sure about Sting is nothing’s for sure.”
