WWE News: Hall Of Famer Announces Retirement From In-Ring Competition
Some wrestlers have huge televised celebrations when they retire from the squared circle, while others end their careers on a quieter note. D-Von Dudley hasn’t competed in a wrestling match for several years, but the WWE Hall of Famer never officially announced that he’d hung up his boots. However, during a recent interview with Table Talk, Dudley confirmed that his in-ring days are officially over.
As quoted by Pro Wrestling Sheet, Dudley revealed that he retired earlier than he wanted to, but he has no regrets about stopping when he did. The former superstar has since transitioned into a backstage role, but he hasn’t ruled out appearing on television whenever he’s asked to.
“Even though I was a little frustrated about not continuing to wrestle for that one more year that I wanted, I’m extremely happy now being a producer and not wrestling. I have officially hung it up, I’m done. Except for different appearances that they may want me to do on the show, but no more wrestling. No more fighting for the titles. None of that anymore. I’m done. I’m officially done.”
Dudley’s in-ring career lasted 28 years and he bowed out at the top level. Along with his former tag team partner Bubba Ray, he was an active member of the WWE roster as recently as 2016. During the years where he and Bubba were gone from WWE, they still wrestled for top wrestling promotions, such as Impact and Ring of Honor.
Dudley can consider himself among the rare breed of performers who can compete for almost three decades at the top level. According to the Hall of Famer, he’s very proud of everything he accomplished during that time. However, despite having such a long and storied career, he said it passed by very quickly.
“The old-timers used to tell me don’t blink, because when you do it’s over. It goes that fast. And it did feel like it went really, really fast.”
Dudley went on to reveal that he’s most proud of what he accomplished with Bubba. The team won the Tag Team Championships in every major promotion on the planet. In the early 2000s, they took tag team wrestling to the next level by pioneering the Tables, Ladders and Chairs match alongside Edge and Christian and The Hardy Boyz. According to the Hall of Famer, he is proud of how people always mention the duo any time they discuss tag team wrestling.
During the interview, Dudley also shed some light on the real backstage reaction to Becky Lynch‘s pregnancy announcement on this week’s Monday Night Raw.
