10 Wrestlers Too Big To Fail (That Failed Anyway)
2. Ric Flair (WWF, 1991-1992)
In the spring of 1991, NWA legend Ric Flair was 42 years old and in the middle of a dispute with WCW boss Jim Herd over his future. Herd, with no appreciation for wrestling history, wanted to phase out Flair’s place at the top of the card and repackage him as a shaven-headed gladiator character. Flair balked and Herd fired him: the Nature Boy took the Big Gold Belt with him when he left.
By August, Flair was signed to the WWF, making his first appearance with the WCW title because wrestling promoters make sharks look like Sunday school teachers. Finally, everyone was going to get the dream match: Ric Flair versus Hulk Hogan, with WrestleMania VIII only a few months away.
The match had been fantasy booked for years: everyone knew it would be a phenomenon. Almost immediately, McMahon began teasing Flair/Hogan in house shows across the country.
The big pay-per-view match never happened. Supposedly, McMahon was unhappy with the numbers and believed the match was five years too late. Flair went on to win the WWF title at the Royal Rumble the following January, but dropped it to Randy Savage in the middle of the card at WrestleMania VIII.
He’d regain the title from Savage in September, but only as a stop-gap to drop it to Bret Hart - and that’s when McMahon informed Flair that he wasn’t going to be the main event in New York either. Flair would be back at WCW within four months.