Ric Flair's Main TV Roles Show Character(s) WWE Raw Ric Flair WCW Monday Nitro Ric Flair WCW Clash of the Champions Ric Flair

Main Movie Roles

BIOGRAPHY:

Richard Morgan Fliehr isn't what you'd expect from a professional wrestler. A medical student at Minnesota University (his father was a doctor, his mother an actress), Flair dropped out college to train for the mat wars under legendary former AWA World champ Verne Gagne. He made his professional wrestling debut on December 10, 1972, wrestling "Scrap Iron" George Gadaski (real name: John Kosti) to a ten minute draw in Rice Lake, Wisconsin. After spending the first few months of his career with Gagne's Minneapolis Boxing & Wrestling Club (which used the brand name "American Wrestling Association"), Flair moved on to Charlotte, North Carolina where he became a regular for Jim Crockett Promotions (a member of the worldwide sanctioning body known as the National Wrestling Alliance) under the direction of matchmaker (wrestling terminology for writer) George Scott. In 1981, he captured his first NWA World title (he would hold that belt officially nine other times). Later on, he would work for both World Championship Wrestling (a company formed by Ted Turner after buying the wrestling assets of JCP) and Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Entertainment. He has been officially recognized as a World champion (an honor which generally signifies that a wrestler is the top attraction in any given company) 21 times, garnering recognition from the NWA, WWE, and WCW (as well as the WCW spin-off group WCWI, or World Championship Wrestling International). He is the only man in wrestling history to hold all four versions of the title.


TRIVIA:

• Submitted to Ricky Steamboat's Double Arm Chicken Wing during a best of 3 falls match in 1989. It was the first time he submitted during a title match until, he lost the WWF Title when he submitted to Bret "The Hitman" Hart's SharpShooter, which resulted in Hart winning the World Title for the first time.
• Flair returned to WCW in February 1993, and hosted a short-lived talk show in WCW called A Flair For The Gold as a compromise to work around a no-compete clause in his previous WWF contract.
• Voted number 3 in a list of the "Best Wrestlers of the Century".
• Bills himself as a 16-time former World Champion, however different wrestling historians put the number at anywhere between 15 and 22, depending upon some officially unrecognized victories.
• Won his second WWF World Title by defeating 'Randy Savage' (qv).
• Cousin (at least in terms of wrestling storyline) of the Anderson family (Gene, Lars, Ole, and Arn). Also, the 'nephew' of wrestler Rip Hawk.
• Allowed 'Carlos Colon (II)' (qv). to defeat him for the NWA Championship in Puerto Rico in order to prevent a riot. Later on, the title was returned to him.
• Entered the 1992 Royal Rumble at #3, lasted over an hour, and ended up winning the vacant WWF Championship.