The Undertaker and me

Taker vs Mankind at King of the Ring

This wasn't meant to be a retrospective of Undertaker's whole career. And, it won't be.

But, as I mentioned earlier, Undertaker's career went hand in hand with my own wrestling fandom. When his career started to stagnate (despite another WWF Championship win), my interest started to stagnate. When the Attitude Era began and he the Deadman started to dive headfirst into the stories being told, I started getting interested again. The Undertaker wasn't my favorite wrestler, but he was always the one who determined if I was still a fan or not,

Then, there was King of the Ring 1998 and Hell In A Cell.

The match was Undertaker vs Mankind and it would change the way everybody looked at wrestling from there on in.

Just a few minutes into the match, Undertaker (who was still struggling with a broken foot) climbed to the top of the cage, grabbed Mankind by the head, and literally tossed him to the ground, through a table. Take yourself back to 1998, when something like that never happened. All the credit in the world to Mick Foley for staying in that match and everything that happened afterwards....

Undertaker grabbed Mankind by the hair and tossed him off the top of a 15-foot cage, onto a folding table. And history was made.

Mick Foley gets the majority of the credit for the impact of that match - and rightfully so - but Undertaker's contribution to that bout can't be ignored. If that match made Foley a legend, Undertaker was the one who made him.