Triple H Gives His Thoughts on Why The Undertaker Has Not Retired

WWE Chief Operating Officer and 14-time World Champion Triple H recently spoke to CBSSports.com and gave his thoughts on why The Undertaker has not yet fully retired from in-ring competition:

It’s an addiction. The crowd, the thrill of it, there’s nothing like it. To stand in that ring and have those emotions in your hand — that feeling is incredible. It’s the greatest form of entertainment when it’s done well.

Think of it this way: What other sport or anything else can bring 100,000 into a stadium where you’re not focused on everything but the fans? If you go in to play the Super Bowl, you’re thinking about the game. You’re almost trying to shut out the fan experience and concentrate on the game. Don’t let the bigness, the epicness of it, the moment of it get to you. You just want to focus on the game. If you’re a fighter and you’re fighting in a stadium and it’s sold out, your focus is on the other fighter. You can’t focus on the crowd and take your mind off the game. In our business, it’s the exact opposite. It’s those fans and that moment. That’s what you’re trying to get out of them and you’re so in tune with those reactions.

When you’re really good at this and have done it for a long time, their reaction is like your heartbeat. It’s the most exciting, intoxicating thing that there is. To put that down is really difficult. I don’t like saying this because it sounds shallow, but it’s almost everything that you are. So, it’s tough and a catch-22. If you go in there and don’t feel like you had the performance you want, ‘Oh man, I can’t leave it that way.’ If you go in there and you tear it up and it was great, ‘I can do that again. I still got it and can continue to do this. That wasn’t so bad. I got more.’

It’s tough. When the feeling is good, you want to do it again and you keep doing it. When it’s bad, you can’t leave it that way because you have to end on a good note. I hear people say, and I’ve heard Taker say, "it’s chasing the dragon. You’re always going to chase the dragon.”