10 Most Inspirational Rehab Comebacks In Wrestling

3. William Regal

We€™ve mentioned how the best professional wrestlers can €˜turn it on€™ once they walk through the curtain, deliver a fantastic performance, and then fall apart once again in private. Well, in the 1990s Darren €˜William Regal€™ Matthews was the king of the game face€ but even he couldn€™t hide the extent of his drug addiction by the end, his physique suffering, his ring work becoming phoned in to the extent that sometimes he€™d just leave a message. In 1997, while working for WCW as Steven Regal, Regal was arrested and taken off a plane on the way home from Japan for, amongst other things, urinating on a flight attendant while wasted. He remembered nothing of the incident, of course €“ and WCW didn€™t really act upon the problem at the time, merely suspending him as punishment for the legal snafu. Upon his return, Regal would be involved in an incident with Goldberg that would have Eric Bischoff sitting up and taking notice: that, coupled with his below par work and the arrest, would be enough for him to be released a little while later. Matthews would find work with the WWF fairly easily, but his drug problems were beyond hiding by this point €“ he actually passed out during the job interview with McMahon and Jim Ross. Rock bottom was a long way away though (well, he€™s a tall bloke) €“ he€™d cause havoc with his family and nearly drive himself properly insane with his excessive drug taking, far, far beyond his ability to work through. At one point, he locked himself in a bedroom for weeks on end, grimly focused on turning his brain to pointless mush. Waking up in hospital for the final time was his wake-up call. It was like a light being flicked on in his skull: he was, simply put, ready to quit and sort his life out. Darren Matthews has been clean and sober for sixteen years now, and is a credit to the industry and to life in general, one of the leading lights of WWE backstage and in NXT, where his thirty-two years of experience working professionally worldwide is instrumental in fostering the next generation of professional wrestlers.