This Sunday’s Survivor Series will serve as The Undertaker’s Final Farewell, as he first debuted in WWE 30 years ago at the 1990 Survivor Series.
Every notable wrestler that has stepped foot into WWE over the last three decades has encountered The Undertaker, whether that be in the ring or in backstage interactions.
Drew McIntyre had just two matches with The Undertaker, but it was the moments outside the ring which left a lasting impression on McIntyre. He shared some of his favorite memories of The Undertaker in an interview with ViBe & Wrestling.
“Hopefully Undertaker’s okay with me doing impressions of him; it’s like everyone knows Drew does impressions as well. That was pretty much like, my favorite interaction with him. I was just a young kid, just not quite understanding the lessons he was trying to teach me, and I wish I could go back in the time machine and just listen to those conversations when he was trying to help me out. He was speaking at such a high wrestling IQ that I wasn’t quite following him,” admitted McIntyre.
“Some of the funny things he said, like, ‘I’ve got more hair on my ass than you’ve got in your face’ when I tried to grow a beard for the first time… But one of the bigger things was like, observing him was a big thing for me, just watching the kind of person he was, or he is, and how much respect he had in the locker room. I’ve seen him and I can talk about this because it’s in The Last Ride and it’s not a secret anymore – I’ve seen him and how much pain he was in, and he would not show it to anybody unless I caught him.”
The Undertaker battling through pain to give the WWE Universe what they want is well documented. But McIntyre shared a first-hand account of the lengths The Undertaker went in order to be a locker room leader and take pride in his work.
“Anyways, when he thought he was alone, I could observe just that he was in a lot of physical pain. But he was such a proud man, and he was so proud of at the time – it was kind of Raw versus SmackDown. Still is, but at the time, on the European tours, he was very proud that SmackDown would draw higher numbers than Raw during the international tours,” said McIntyre.
“And he kind of led by example, and he would fight through every night no matter what pain he was in. And I caught him a few times like, struggling backstage. But when he was in front of that crowd, you would never know as he was flying around the ring like a cruiserweight, giving everything he had 110 percent every night. That’s not TV – this is like, the house shows. This is the non-televised stuff, and I saw that kind of work ethic no matter what condition he was in. I thought, ‘Alright, this is the guy right here. This is somebody who loves this industry and this is someone I want to be like.'”
