WWE Hall of Famer Nikolai Volkoff Dies at 70

WWE Hall of Famer Nikolai Volkoff died, the company announced Sunday.

He was 70.

"MY BEST FRIEND. MY PARTNER. MY BROTHER. WE GET MORE HEAT THAN ANYONE ON EARTH. I TRUST HIM WITH MY LIFE. HE TAKE CARE OF ME WHEN I WAS DOWN. I MISS YOU FOREVER," The Iron Sheik, Volkoff's longtime tag team partner, said on Twitter.

Volkoff began wrestling in 1967 and embarked on a career that lasted nearly 40 years. He spent the bulk of his time in the WWF and World Wide Wrestling Federation, Vince McMahon Sr.'s precursor to the WWF. He also spent time with the American Wrestling Association in the 1970s.

Volkoff and The Sheik were one of the premier heel tag teams of the 1980s under the management of Classy Freddie Blassie. The pair won the WWF Tag Team Championship once before breaking up.

Volkoff later teamed with Boris Zukhov as part of The Bolsheviks for the remainder of the 1980s before leaving the company in 1990. He briefly returned in 1994 and 1995 as a member of the Million Dollar Corporation before retiring.

A number of people within the wrestling community expressed their condolences on Twitter:

Volkoff's last WWE appearance was in 2014 during an episode of Raw.