10 Wrestlers Who Retired Way Too Early

7. 'Ravishing' Rick Rude

Ravishing Rick Rude
WWE

'Ravishing' Rick Rude's induction into the WWE Hall of Fame finally came in 2017, and it was long overdue. Rude was one of the all-time great wrestling heels. The Ravishing One was an Attitude Era character long before that era came to pass, and he goes down in history as one of the greatest performers to never win the WWE title.

Depressingly, Rude was just 35 years old when he was forced to retire in 1994. That retirement came abruptly to say the least, a severe back injury ending Rude's career just as he won the WCW International World Heavyweight Championship.

Rude sustained the blow taking a suicide dive in a match in Japan against Sting, one which sent him back-first into a raised platform around the ring. After 12 years of taking bumps all over the world, it was something as innocuous as this that ended the veteran's career.

Rude was training for a comeback in 1999, but he sadly died before it could happen. 35 is too young to retire - 40 is far too young to pass away.

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Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.