The Grandest Stage, The Mecca, The Show Of Shows, The Grandaddy of Them All, you know the drill. Each year, an event that started as the biggest day in pro wrestling has turned into what is now a week-long event, kicking off Thursday, and ending the following Tuesday. For some, it comes to a screeching halt Sunday.
WrestleMania, while a culmination of storylines from WWE's calendar year, is also a standalone event, often featuring celebrities and former stars reliving glory or making an effort to give it one last go. The event has also witnessed a farewell to many key components to the machine's success.
John Bradshaw Layfield called it a career when he lost in 21-seconds to Rey Mysterio at WrestleMania 25, only appearing in short Royal Rumble cameos from a competitive perspective. I'll not forget being strangely excited for the styles clash of two men -- admittedly out of their primes
We've seen the likes of Roddy Piper, Diamond Dallas Page, Jimmy Snuka, Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat chase the spotlight in the name of the biggest annual wrestling event. Ric Flair "retired" from WWE at the show. Brie Bella announced she'd be taking time off following WrestleMania 32, and would eventually start a family.
Some aren't so lucky. For many, what they leave in the ring at WrestleMania is the lasting impression of their legacies in the squared circle.
One could argue that wrestler turned Hollywood star The Rock has done this as well. The box office juggernaut technically had a six second match with current Bludgeon Brother Erick Rowan a few years back, but the long lasting ramifications of his 2013 WrestleMania match with John Cena throw his future in the ring into question.
The Rock had his most active run since leaving WWE in 2013 when he had a few matches that led to he and Cena squaring off again at WrestleMania 29. In the heat of the battle, he tore his abdominal and adductor muscles, and filming of the movie Hercules had to be pushed back. Originally scheduled for more matches in WWE, insurance hurdles have been too much to overcome for both WWE and The Rock.
"About midway through the match, I tore my abductor tendon, as well as my rectus tendon, completely off my pelvis," The Rock told ET. "And then I found out that I had three wonderful hernia tears. There's a lot of fun swelling in the 'cash and prizes' area for the first week and a half. Those were sexy times…It's a lot of fun pain to go through. It was almost God's way of saying, 'Well, now you're gonna take a break.'"
We've yet to see The Rock return to the ring for any longer than a Rock Bottom and a pin. Plans were changed, and The Rock has since only appeared in a handful of cameo spots.
The Rock would be a part of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin's last match, too. Although rumors seemed to circulate fairly regularly about Austin returning, it seems pretty well in the rearview mirror at this point. After a public spat with WWE in 2002, Austin returned in early 2003 for a trio of matches that closed out his brief, but legendary WWE in-ring career. Two of those matches would be with a non-wrestler in Eric Bischoff, so in reality Austin had one competitive match after walking out of the company.
Furthermore, Austin was hospitalized the night before WrestleMania, and nearly didn't even make it to the show after being dehydrated from energy drinks. He knew it'd be his last match, as he had "OMR" on his vest, signifying "One More Round." With as integral as Austin was to WWE's history, he didn't get the farewell that many others did. In fact, it was kept a complete secret that he'd be retiring.
“The reason for that was, it was going to be my last match, WrestleMania 19. The neck had caught up with me. Everything had caught up with me. And we didn't announce that, 'hey, this is going to be 'Stone Cold's [last] match' because this was the third and final match with The Rock. He was going over. He didn't say it was going to be my last match because the promotion was still doing pretty good. The momentum was still good. It might have started to slow down a little bit, but if you've just announced, 'hey this is going to be 'Stone Cold's last match,' maybe that would kind of slowed business down or slowed the momentum down and maybe turned some people off," said Austin on his podcast. "They didn't need to get me over or preserve me for the next match, but they needed to do that for the Rock. Whether I was staying or going, it was time for him to go over. I don't have any regrets. A lot of people take it too seriously and work themselves into a shoot like I did in Atlanta, Georgia when I didn't want to do the honors for Brock and took my ball and went home. If you go into a lull and say 'this is Stone Cold's last match,' that's kind of a downer."
Edge had an in ring career that lasted longer than Steve Austin and The Rock's did, although he never reached the mainstream legend level they did. Within WWE circles, he was among the best workers they had, and was a main eventer the last five years of his career -- one that he saw coming to an end, but was cut even shorter.
“I was already preparing (to retire). I was ready and physically was forcing me to mentally prepare. It was more of a realization, mentally, was I tired of travel? Yes, but it was also because physically I was tired of the travel and that lent to the mental tiredness. But it wasn’t like I was like, ‘I’m done. I’m fed up. I can’t stand this anymore," Edge said on an episode of the Sam Roberts Show.
Alberto Del Rio was on the rise in 2011, winning WWE's first and only 40-man Royal Rumble match. Many expected the new star to capture Edge's World Heavyweight Championship at that year's WrestleMania and take the torch. Edge emerged victorious, but would retire just two weeks later. It was suspected that WWE had to know before WrestleMania that Edge wouldn't have been in any condition to continue wrestling, and the result gained some criticism. Edge, however, defended himself.
“The way I look at it is I had to retire as world champion with my last match at WrestleMania. Oh, that’s horrible. That sucks! What are you talking about? That’s fucking awesome! Yeah, ah, he wanted to win in his last match! What an asshole! It’s like, no, I just (can't wrestle). What do you want me to do? I’d put somebody over. I’ve got no problem.”
Edge only performed in an 8-man tag team dark match following WrestleMania, and barely made contact in the match, and would hang up his boots the following week, never to work a wrestling match again.
This year's WrestleMania event will showcase a bonus glimpse of The Undertaker, a 27-plus year veteran of WWE that many thought came to an end last year. In the event of The Rock, Edge and Stone Cold Steve Austin, their runs were completely overlapped by that of "The Dead Man."
WrestleMania also promotes the likes of Daniel Bryan, Kurt Angle, even Shane McMahon -- names that many thought we would never see compete again. While some stars that are on their way out are clear, don't take for granted who is performing in the ring and on the screen Sunday. Sometimes, you don't know what you've got until it's gone.
