When The Undertaker Knew WWE Career Was Over

The Undertaker knew the right time to put an end to his WWE career. 

On the subject of wrestling retirements, critics of the business and fans will always argue about the right way to end a career.

When Sting wrapped up his career in AEW in 2024, he was victorious in a tag team match with Darby Allin over The Young Bucks, while some people complained that a guy in his 60s like Sting lost zero matches in his entire AEW run.

John Cena tapped out to Gunther in his final match last December, and many people were upset about it because. After all, Cena was the man who proudly said, “Never Give Up” for decades, yet in his final match, he literally gave up to end his career.

For The Undertaker, he had his last match in front of no fans. That’s because it happened at WrestleMania 36 in 2020, which was the only WrestleMania that had no fans in attendance. After 30 years on WWE television, the Deadman retired in front of nobody except the camera crew that filmed his final match.

The Undertaker Knew Boneyard Match Was The End Of His WWE Career

In the main event of WrestleMania 36 Saturday, The Undertaker’s Boneyard Match with AJ Styles aired. It was filmed somewhere in Florida in a setting that was made to look like a graveyard, or boneyard in this case.

While Styles had some help from his friends Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson, The Deadman was able to deal with all of them and win the match by putting Styles in a grave and burying him in dirt.

After the cinematic match, which looked more like a movie fight scene than a pro wrestling match, The Undertaker rode off on a motorcycle like he had done many times in his WWE career.

During a recent episode of his Six Feet Under podcast with AJ Styles as the guest, The Undertaker recalled the late night Boneyard Match and how he knew riding off on that motorcycle was the end for him.

Undertaker: “When I rode off, it was – I don’t know – maybe 45 minutes until the sun started peaking through. 3:30 [or] 4 in the morning is when it dawned on me that this was pretty much it for me. My body – although I was in shape, it was very apparent to me.

It was somewhere in those early morning hours that I realized that this was gonna be it.

“I think it was meant to be.

Styles: “As bad as it was, COVID and what not, you literally rode off. That’s the way you go out, right there.”

The Boneyard Match between The Undertaker and AJ Styles was widely praised and is remembered as perhaps the best match from the bizarre 2020 COVID-19 era of WWE programming.