Ric Flair, legendary wrestler celebrates his 71st birthday today. Yeah, the man definitely had a lot of problems over the years like his struggle with alcoholism, relationships with women, dealt with the death of his son Reid Flair and all kinds of things as he has confessed in his book that he wrote with Charlotte, “Second Nature”… which is his only tell-all book pretty much. Anyway, no matter what you think of Ric love him or hate him, he is a wrestling legend.
Other than Hulk Hogan, Macho Man and Andre The Giant being a few of the biggest names in pro wrestling history… Ric Flair is right up there with them. I mean, Ric is a guy who worked for every professional wrestling company you can think of. He worked for old school WWF, then he worked for WCW for many years, then he returned to WWE later on… he also worked for TNA Impact for a long while.
In the early days, though, Ric started out wrestling in the AWA and he wrestled in Japan for a lot of years too. He worked for Jim Crockett’s “World Championship Wrestling” before it became Ted Turner’s “WCW” later on. Ric worked for the NWA in the 80’s before making his way into the old WWF in 1991.
Ric Flair’s entire life was based on wrestling… that was all he ever did and all he ever knew. That was the only thing that he made a living on pretty much… he made his money through wrestling over the years. Ric definitely loved wrestling ’cause he kept at it until Vince forced him to retire in 2008 where he had his last wrestling match against Shawn Michaels at Wrestlemania 24. Ric never wrestled again after that.
Why did Ric retire from wrestling? Well his age for starters and his body probably couldn’t take it anymore, plus he had some big health scares not too long ago so he would probably never wrestle in a ring ever again. He still does make WWE appearances occasionally, though.
Ric is the one who started the Four Horsemen group which is the biggest wrestling faction of all time… the original Four Horsemen with Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Tully Blanchard and JJ Dillon. The Horsemen group started in the NWA and then went on to WCW with different members.
Ric is a legendary wrestler who is a 16 time world champion… and he had many classic matches that we’ll never forget and he had some pretty excellent feuds. He had many great matches with Ricky Steamboat.
I got to see Ric Flair wrestle live in person… it was at the Royal Rumble 1992 ppv in Albany NY when it used to be called “The Knickerbocker Arena”. Yeah, I got the opportunity to witness Ric Flair winning his first world title that night and it was an amazing night and probably the best Royal Rumble and I was glad I got to see it live. I didn’t get very good seats, though, I remember sitting at the very top of the arena but I could still see the ring pretty good. It’s definitely one of the best Rumble’s in the history of wrestling for sure.
Ric is one of my all time favorite wrestlers other than Hulk Hogan, the Warrior, Owen Hart, Sting and Randy Savage. Ric was the best.
Even though Ric is a retired wrestler now, he still finds ways to stay involved in the business like make occasional appearances in WWE, I know Ric had his own podcast show for a little while, he still does autograph signings sometimes and things like that. He still has pretty strong passion for the business even though he doesn’t wrestle anymore.
Happy birthday, Ric and I’m sure he’s enjoying it with his family and friends. Wooooo….
Kev
K'Brocking 
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