WWE Pays Tribute To Sting On Raw
Michael Cole and Pat McAfee paid tribute to Sting's career and his "epic" AEW Revolution match.
In most cases, a wrestling company spending a few seconds paying respect to the career of one of the greatest to ever lace up a pair of boots shouldn't be a big deal. Due to how WWE has handled such matters over the decades, though, a mention of Sting on last night's Raw very much becomes noteworthy.
Famously, WWE has so often avoided referring to those not with the company, let alone someone who's one day removed from headlining a PPV for a rival promotion. That was then, and this is now, with the stewardship of Paul Levesque and Nick Khan clearly having a different viewpoint to Vince McMahon on those moments.
As such, WWE Raw had Michael Cole and Pat McAfee send congratulations to "the great Sting" as Gunther and Dominik Mysterio squared off. In fact, McAfee would even reference the "absolutely epic match" that saw Sting and Darby Allin retain the AEW Tag Team Titles against the Young Bucks in the AEW Revolution main event.
Michael Cole:
“I wanna send our congratulations out to another great champion. After nearly 40 years, the great Sting has retired from professional wrestling. Thanks for the memories. Congratulations to Sting.”#WWERAW pic.twitter.com/KMk3xaIVBe
Advertisement— ?????? (@WrestlingCovers) March 5, 2024
Historically, WWE would outright go out of their way to avoid mentioning someone not signed to the promotion, but thankfully such pettiness seems to be in the rear-view mirror. One other instance of this came at WWE Elimination Chamber last month, where Michael Cole casually name-dropped AEW's Chris Jericho; something that never would've happened under the previous regime. Likewise, both Taz and Jim Ross got mentions on this week's Raw.
Either way, it was a nice touch for WWE to, well, do the classy thing and acknowledge the retirement of a trailblazer, a game-changer, and a true icon of the business.