Since the final episode of The Last Ride docu-series, The Undertaker has seemingly hung up his boots. While the three-decade veteran seems to be done for good this time, nothing is ever set in stone in the professional wrestling world. Speaking to Yahoo.com, Taker stressed that he personally is done, but his in-ring future will always remain uncertain.
“I’m going with it, but I work for a man by the name of Vince McMahon, whose motto is ‘Never say never,'” Taker said. “And I’ll kind of leave that there. In my eyes, yeah, I am officially retired.”
This year’s Survivor Series is set to celebrate 30 Years of The Undertaker, as the Deadman made his WWE debut at that same event. When Taker’s return to WWE programming was announced, speculation ran wild about whether this meant he was getting back in the ring. Taker emphasized that he will be at the show, but his role remains to be seen.
“Well, I will definitely be at Survivor Series,” Taker said. “And what I do there, there’s no telling. But I will be live at Survivor Series. You never know what will happen, and we’ve got a couple of weeks (laughs).”
With his in-ring days seemingly behind him, Undertaker represents one of the final competitors from the Attitude Era. The wrestling landscape has changed drastically since that time, with WWE Champions shifting from big guys like Taker, Diesel, and Steve Austin to smaller, agile athletes like AJ Styles, Daniel Bryan, and Rey Mysterio. Taker says he doesn’t think anyone’s size should disqualify them from becoming champion, but he says a champion should look believable.
“It doesn’t necessarily have to be a big guy big guy, but we have stretched the realms of reality sometimes with some of our champions,” Taker said. “When you see some of the guys that they have to work with, it’s like, OK, I get it, we’re sports entertainment — BUT. My whole goal when I went to the ring, I don’t care if you’re smart, not smart, whatever, when I’m in the ring I want people thinking, ‘This dude’s legit.’ And if I hit somebody, I want people in the front row going, ‘No, dude, he hit him. I don’t care what happened in the match before, he just lit him up. This is on.’ So it’s hard because we’re kind of starting to get a little bit of an influx of big guys, but it’s just kind of where– because there’s so much new talent, you can’t put the title on a guy just because he’s big. And back in the day, man, we had tons of big guys that could go and could carry it and do that.
“So it’s more of a guy that kind of fits in the middle of the road. A guy that you’ll believe working with a big guy but can also work with a little guy. But there are certain guys that have had — I won’t bring in names — but it’s just like, yeah, I just don’t buy it. I don’t buy this as my champion. And it’s not any fault of their own, other than they’re physically not able to match up against certain people.”
If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Yahoo! Entertainment.