10 Wrestlers Who Retired Too Young-9

9. The Rock

Sure, he’s still involved in wrestling now. Like the time he came back in 2011 and said this: “I wanna tell you ‘thank you’. I love you. And it is because of you that I am back in this ring and it is because of you, and I give you my word, I am never ever going away” Remember? When he said that? Before he went away again?

The Rock left the WWE for the first time in April 2003 after losing to Goldberg at Backlash. He left to pursue his acting career full time (some joke that turned out to b–oh wait, no, that totally worked out) after spending the previous few years taking the occasional brief hiatus to film movies. It was the WWE fans though, during this period, who created The Rock’s greatest character: the “Hollywood Heel”.

The Rock, who was the WWE’s biggest baby face at the time, kept taking time away from the company to film movies, and the fans got sick of this. They expect their heroes to stick around and fight for them week after week. Rocky wasn’t doing this so they turned on him, creating perhaps the most underused heel run of all time. The Rock, at his best when playing arrogant “I’m just better than you” characters, thrived in this role. He’d come back from filming, cut promos about how he doesn’t need to be there, how he’s only there for the money, and he’d go up against a big babyface.

This could have continued indefinitely. In reality, The Rock stayed away from the WWE for so long that now he’s in that “Legend” category. When he comes back it’s exciting and nostalgic and he will never be booed again. Imagine though, if “Hollywood Heel” Rock kept returning sporadically between 2003 and now. Returning, cutting a promo about why he’s only back for the money, why this is an easy pay check for him, losing to a top face and off he goes again. It was a fascinating character that was nowhere near being explored to it’s full potential.