WWE Hall of Famer The Undertaker was fortunate enough to end his in-ring career on his own terms during the pandemic when he squared off with AJ Styles in a cinematic Boneyard match.
The American Badass rode off into the night but has continued making cameo appearances in WWE, most recently at WrestleMania 40. There, The Undertaker sent The Rock packing with a chokeslam during Cody Rhodes' match with Roman Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship.
Talking to Chris Van Vliet, the Phenom admitted that he's open to doing something similar down the line, even though he now feels like he has closure on his in-ring career.
"Yeah, I could do it. I couldn’t do it to the standard that I wanted to do it. There’s certain things that I don’t feel like I would be able to do. After I did it, I came back, and I was like, ‘I’m good now. I don’t need to do this again.’ Not saying that I wouldn’t if they needed something like that again, but I’m not going to have a match, or I’m not coming out of retirement. Yeah, that’s it [boneyard match]. That’s the way I have to look at it."
Elsewhere in the conversation, the iconic pro wrestler reflected on realising the time had come for him to retire and the challenges of figuring out what he'd do next.
"It’s weird. I knew that it was going to come, but I wasn’t mentally preparing myself for it. I always just thought I was going to be able to do it, and realistically, Father Time is undefeated. I knew early on, even when I was still working, and I love this business so much, but I knew I was going to have a hard time. People always ask me, 'Well why don’t you go down to the PC? Why don’t you be a mentor?' When I’m around, I do that kind of stuff. But as an everyday deal, I can’t do it."
"Because recently, I’ve just kind of had closure at Mania. I don’t know if you heard this but I struggled since I retired at being at live events. I would go. I was at the Rumble because I had the 1DeadMAN Show in Clearwater. I stayed over, and I was at the Rumble. By the time I think maybe the first match had gone out, I left. Because internally, my body and my mind is [thinking] you should be getting ready, you should be going out there and I get almost, I wouldn’t say anxiety, but I just get this feeling like I can’t take it because I want to be out there so bad."
"I wanted to continue to wrestle, obviously, my body broke down and Father Time is undefeated, I never wanted to be a parody of myself and I really risked that at the end. I had some matches that I think, maybe at one point in my career, they were bad. But there was one point in my career I felt like I could take anything and turn it around and I just didn’t have it in me, like the match I had with Goldberg in Saudi Arabia."
"I should have picked up on the fact that he had his bell rung, and then [he] rung it again when he hit the post, I should have been sharp enough to adapt at that point, and not try to get to where I was getting."
As sad as it was to bid farewell to the Deadman, it did reach a point where it was hard to ignore that his matches had begun declining in quality (something The Undertaker acknowledges here and has discussed in several previous interviews).
While it's believed his spot at the Show of Shows was originally reserved for Stone Cold Steve Austin, the prevailing opinion is now that it was the right choice to have the former WWE Champion take out the Final Boss.
You can watch the full conversation with The Undertaker in the player below.