Undertaker ‘tired of bitching’ about injury
by Phil Speer (date approx: Jan 22nd, 2002)
GREENVILLE, S.C. – Undertaker may not be 100 percent physically, but he doesn’t much feel like talking about
it.
“My hip is still really sore,” he told WWF.com. “But basically I’m tired of bitching about
it.”
The three-time World Wrestling Federation Champion has been battling a painful case of sciatica since the Jan. 3 episode
of SmackDown!,
when he landed awkwardly after a Big Show chokeslam. He hadn’t wrestled since then until he stepped
in the ring on Sunday for the Rumble.
“(The injury) was on my mind, but you can’t go in the ring thinking about it,” he said. “Otherwise
you’ll injury yourself even worse.”
Asked if he was in fact feeling worse on Monday after being in the ring for the first time in three weeks, Taker responded
only with a stern “no comment.”
Instead of thinking about his injuries at the Rumble, he concentrated on putting beatings on the Hardy Boyz and Maven.
After Taker eliminated Matt and Jeff Hardy, they distracted him, and Maven dropkicked him from behind, eliminating the Dead
Man.
“I was well on my way until the fluke of all flukes happened,” ‘Taker said.
After he was eliminated by Maven, Taker snapped. He went back into the ring and grabbed the “WWF Tough Enough”
winner. He then proceeded to assault him throughout the entire arena. He even belted him with a steel chair over the head
so hard that the chair was practically bent in half.
“I’m a firm believe that if you’re going to swing a chair, swing it,” he said.
(credit: wwf.com)
The Undertaker on XTRA Sports Radio Show
(date possibly summer of 1998)
The Undertaker on XTRA sports radio L.A./San Diego Thurs night; 8:20 - 9:00 p.m. promoting WWF RAW tapings at Anaheim
Pond and San Diego Arena.
He first talked about how he got into the wrestling business. He was approached by other wrestlers at a gym he worked
out at and experienced some difficult periods trying to get noticed by promoters. He played basketball in college. He was
not into football. Said it is difficult to train while on the road. Said that if he lived a normal lifestyle, he would have
more muscle mass and more muscle definition. He pointed out that in his schedule, quality workouts are more important than
the quantity of workouts.
He said that in Hell in The Cell 2, when Mankind fell onto announcer's table, it was as if it occurred in slow motion.
He referred to the incident as one of the "strangest" experiences in his life. He compared it to an out of body experience
watching Foley fall 15 to 25 feet down onto table. UT worked the match with 2 fractures in his ankle. He said Foley is the
one of the toughest guys in the business. Mentioned that Foley makes up for lack of technical skills with guts and a big heart.
He took calls for approximately half an hour long!:
He was asked if he has any off-camera friendships with Austin or DX. He answered question slowly and carefully by stating
that he and Austin don't share beers and does not have friendships behind the curtain. He says he is too busy on concentrating
on other things. (I thought he dodged the question so that he would not expose his off camera relations with others.)
When asked of Flair coming to WWF. He said he does not know anything about Flair's contract status. He just reiterated
fact that WWF is going with a youth movement with one exception. That being the middle-aged crazy Terry Funk. He said the
Flair question comes up to him very frequently.
When asked if Ultimate Warrior's coming back to WWF. Said Warrior has probably come back too many times before. He more
or less said Hellwig was a head case and that he thinks Hellwig does not have much to offer to the wrestling industry. UT
believes it takes more than face paint and rope shaking to perform to the level that crowds expect to see at a house show.
Said Superfly Snuka was way ahead of his time. Snuka did aerial moves when no one else did them. UT has the utmost respect
for Snuka.
Was asked if he was in cahoots with Kane. Said that if he was in cahoots w/Kane, he sure wasn't about to reveal it on
a syndicated radio show.
He said wrestlers have to understand there is a fine line between working hurt vs. injured. Working injured will take
some time away from a worker's career. He said the younger workers often work injured so they don't get out of favor with
the promoters. Once you become an established star, then you can afford to take time off to heal injuries.
He said he has couple more years on current contract and felt WCW is not an option. He said WCW told him that he was
not star material and proved them wrong by successful UT gimmick in WWF. He feels loyalty to McMahon for making him a star
and will end his career with WWF. (I was happy to hear this.) He does not follow the storylines of WCW too much. He leaves
that up to the suits backstage. He concentrates on his role as the UT and giving the fans a good show. He said WWF morale
is very high with the recent ratings victories. He feels no WWF superstar can beat him one on one. He said all his recent
losses are the result of outside interference. He looks forward to Summerslam showdown with Austin since he knows Austin does
not have any alliances with other wrestlers and expects no outside interference in the match.
When asked of his opinion on Rodman/Malone entering the squared circle he said both are great athletes.
However, to perform at a high level in front of an audience, it takes a lot of preparation. He more or less said that
Rodman/Malone did not have the proper training to work a match to the level he expects to see.
He disrespected HBK by calling him a "small man" in the sport. He feels a good "big man" like the UT will always beat
a good "small man".
Every caller was a wrestling fan and complemented UT. They seemed to be WWF fans rather than WCW fans. UT thanked everyone.
In my opinion, many of the wrestling fans out there are very articulate and are "smart" fans who regularly track the wrestleboards
on the internet.
The Undertaker Adds Dark Poetry to Rasslin
By Gemma Tarlach
of the Journal Sentinel staff
-- The Man from the Dark Side. The Phenom. The Reaper.
The professional wrestler known as The Undertaker, in Milwaukee
tonight for
the weekly World Wrestling Federation show being broadcast live from the
Bradley Center, has been called
all this and more. At 6 feet 10 inches and 320-plus pounds,
the Undertaker is one of the WWF's biggest stars -- in every
sense of the word. He manhandles
other wrestlers as if they were party favors and thrills fans with
over-the-top-rope
acrobatics.
But right now, the Man in Black is dead tired.
In Madison for a half-day media blitz, Taker enters the lobby of a local radio station to plug
the WWF's Tuesday
show at the Kohl Center. He moves as if rigor mortis has settled into his
limbs. When he pauses on the threshold, filling
the door frame, he lets out a groan that
sounds like a rusty cemetery gate creaking open.
A small crowd in the lobby waits for him to rumble his signature line: "Rest in Peace."
"I'm just stretching" he says. He spies a coffee pot and pours himself a
cup.
"It's decaf," the station receptionist tells him.
He jumps back like Superman from kryptonite. Someone runs to fetch him the real stuff.
Taker groans again.
"We've been up 22 hours straight," explains Jimmy Dotson, director of
security for the WWF, who travels with the big
man. Wait a minute -- Taker needs a bodyguard?
Stalkers have been a continuing problem, Dotson says, and merely overzealous
fans mob their
hero everywhere.
"Sitting around airports is a real drag," Taker says later in the day, after surviving radio
promos at three different
stations. "Whenever you get recognized, it turns into an impromptu
autograph signing. You try to be as gracious as possible,
but you're tired. If you say no,
people don't understand and just think you're arrogant."
At the moment, Taker is being gracious. He autographs a stack of glossy 8-by-10s for
children of station personnel,
frowning when he smudges a signature and then carefully
redoing it. He answers calls from listeners during an on-air interview
in his best Dead
Man Walking voice.
Once off the air and away from the crowds, Taker's native Texas drawl creeps back into his
voice. But otherwise his
wrestling persona isn't much different from the man himself -- so
much so that even his closest friends and co-workers
call him Undertaker.
"I'm very spiritual," he explains. "I have a real connection with what I
talk about as The Undertaker. I've always
had what some would call a morbid fascination with
the dark side. . . . I'm a little bit different that way."
While Taker's size, natural athletic ability and business acumen (he went to college on a
basketball scholarship
and got a degree in sports management) made him a natural for
wrestling superstardom, the early years of his career were
rough going. Wrestling under a
different name for World Championship Wrestling, the WWF's arch rival, Taker wasn't allowed
to
make his morbid views known.
"They really censored me," he says of his days as a carrot-topped bruiser who
rarely spoke. "They told me, 'You have
no personality.' "
Fortunately for both Taker and the WWF, when he joined the organization in 1990,
WWF owner Vince McMahon let him
run with his necrocentric ideas. Since then, he's consistently
been one of their top draws. His legions of fans, nicknamed
"Creatures of the Night," identify
with his melancholy demeanor and tendency to wax poetic about communing with lost souls.
His almost Byronic nature make him unique in a world dominated by big-mouthed blonds forever
crowing about their greatness.
The T-shirt-wearing, action-figure-buying Creatures have helped fund a comfortable existence
for Taker, who now resides
in Florida -- difficult as it is to imagine the
Man from the Dark Side calling the Sunshine State home. On his rare days
off,
Taker can afford to design and tool around in his collection of custom motorcycles.
But success has had its price.
Just 36, Taker navigates a stairway with the care of a man twice his age, grumbling under his
breath about bad hips.
More than a decade of almost nightly poundings has taken its toll.
A relentless schedule puts him in the ring about 250
nights a year, not including travel time
and scheduled public appearances like his Madison media blitz.
"Injuries are my only breaks," he said wearily. "Then I get some time
off to recuperate."
He keeps going simply because he is The Undertaker, and will always be -- until fatigue and
chronic pain, hellhounds
forever at his heels, catch him.
"It's a very fine line between dictating to your body what it should do, and doing what your
body tells you it should
do," he says. "But I'll be around as long as I can deliver what
people expect to see from me. I don't want to be out there
as a shadow of what I once was."
Has all the pummeling been worth it?
"Yes," he says with absolute certainty. "I made a sacrifice when I made
the decision to do this, but it's paid off
ten-fold."
The man in black has more than enough gray matter to articulate his many ideas about
life -- and death -- but he's
run out of time. A WWF publicist signals him to wrap things up.
He's got less than half an hour to make a final stop and
then catch a flight home for a whole
day and a half off before hitting the road again.
"Don't let people tell you that you can't achieve something because you're
different. It's OK to be different as long
as you do it without hurting anyone," he says as he
stands, cracking a rare smile. "That's pretty ironic, coming from the
Undertaker, since it's
my job to hurt people."
The Undertaker: "I made a sacrifice when I made the decision to do this, but it's
paid off ten-fold."