10 Wrestlers Who Regretted Coming Out Of Retirement
8. Tatanka
After leaving WWE in 1996, Tatanka had a short stint in the indies during 1997. He is notable for not jumping to WCW upon his WWE exit, instead leaving the business to start a family.
On 1 August 2005 edition of Raw, Tatanka was scheduled for a one-off appearance, facing off against Kurt Angle with the Olympian’s gold medals on the line. Tatanka was unsuccessful due to Angle triggering a DQ. Nevertheless, it led to a full-time spot, first on C-show Velocity, followed by a place on the SmackDown roster.
He had a semi-successful run in a thrown together tag team with Matt Hardy, but despite his in-ring work, his gimmick was notably ill-fitting during WWE’s Ruthless Aggression Era. Despite the company’s best efforts, including vignettes that showed Tatanka being adopted into the Oglala Sioux Tribe, the gimmick remained an anomaly on the roster. This wasn’t helped when he was booked as angry and paranoid regarding his losing streak. He soon requested his release.
Tatanka explained the dissatisfaction that led to his exit:
“The fans we're there for me 100% but the storyline we we're going to go with from that point unfortunately did not go where it should of went […] its been that way with many people […] Storylines [...] start and they drop the ball or take a turn and not the right turn […] I'm very happy how strong the fans we're there for me but the storylines did not just start out and finish the way we wanted to finish […] I’m on good terms with WWE no bad feelings.”
Biting his lip and highlighting the positive worked in Tatanka’s favour. The company awarded him a legends contract in 2015.