A Personal Note to Ric Flair: Would You Please Leave the Business of Wrestling?

As a huge fan of the man I used to know, someone I have interviewed and been in the presence of many times over the years, this letter is sent out to you, Ric Flair.

Could you do us all a favor and please leave the business or the “sport” you love to call wrestling?

There has never been a wrestler in the 35 years I have been watching on television and in arenas that has captivated me more and made me more than depressed at seeing what has become of you. And I speak for many when I say that seeing a decrepit person who had appeared on television, slurring his speech and trying to “Be the Man” again, failed quite miserably.

According to a report on digitaljournal.com, “Following no-showing multiple live events for TNA and amassing large bar tabs at hotels, Ric Flair and TNA have parted ways recently starting the rumors that Flair will make his way back to the WWE.”

Say it isn’t so, Ric. North Carolina and the mountains are calling you. The home for retired wrestlers is calling you. Please do not become another Scott Hall or Matt Hardy or even Jake Roberts. They have fallen from grace, and right now, you can salvage some dignity by just walking away.

While I see the importance of you staying in the business now that the WWE has signed your daughter, Ashley, to a developmental contract, it is not necessary for you to show your mug on camera any time soon. I want to remember you for the style, the grace and the ability to make a broom stick look great in the ring. Not the old man you have become.

Don’t you see this pains me to write such a demand?

It was a cold night in Florence, S.C. that we met, talked about the business and then you went out and kicked Barry Windham’s ass. It was that time when meeting one of my idols was realized. It was that night that I remember, for once, I thought wrestling was real.

Nothing is real anymore about how you have disgraced yourself and the business you are still involved in. And if the report is correct and you do return to the WWE, please remain in an advisory role. Do not get in the ring. Do not fight with John Laurinaitis (although a figure-four would set him straight). Help the Bo Rotundos and Tyson Kidds of the world. Help with growth and development. Help them get over that way.

But please do not put on a pair of tights and claim to the “the man” and “God” in the same vignette—it does not work anymore.

When I look at the wrestling gods and who should be on Mt. Rushmore, I am taken back to you and Harley Race, and Jack Brisco and Dusty Rhodes. Those were matches that meant something.

That was when you meant something. Now you are nothing more than a distraction. And while you can still “Woooo!” with the best of them and wrestlers imitate your knife-edge chops all over the building, it would be better to remember what you did for the business and not what you are doing to the business right now, Ric.

Please do the right thing. Please just go away.