Kane, the Undertaker

Mark Calaway, the Undertaker, is without a doubt one of the most popular and well known professional wrestlers in the world and in the history of professional wrestling. He began his wrestling career in the World Class Championship Wrestling in 1984 as Texas Red and then in 1985 he joined the USWA when Jerry Lawler was part owner of it and went by the name of the Master of Pain. He has also enjoyed such names as the Commando, the Punisher and even Punisher Dice Morgan. When he entered the NWA, he wrestled under the name of Mean Mark Callous and replaced an injured Sid Vicious to become one half of the Skyscrapers with Dangerous Dan Spivey.

However, his claim to fame would come in 1990 when he entered the WWF as Kane the Undertaker and was Ted DiBiase’s mystery partner in the Survivor Series. He was managed by Brother Love. Soon, he dropped the Kane moniker, which ironically would later be picked up by Glen Jacobs and the storyline that he and the Undertaker were half brothers. By this time, the Undertaker was managed by Paul Bearer. Calaway’s character of the Undertaker is supposed to be based on the undertakers of the Old West and is even been said that his character was based on a character from a Stephen King novel. The Undertaker is undefeated in his Wrestlemania appearances and hopes to keep that up at this year’s Wrestlemania, Wrestlemania 24 when he faces Edge for the World Heavyweight Title. As far as undefeated streaks are concerned, the Undertaker enjoyed another undefeated streak. From December 1991 to September 1993, the Undertaker had not lost one match and also to his credit shares the distinction with Shawn Michaels as being the only two active WWE wrestlers that appeared on the very first Monday Night Raw fifteen years ago and are still wrestling today in the WWE.

He wasn’t always the Deadman though. For a couple of years beginning in 2000, he returned to the ring after suffering a groin injury, as a biker and went by the name of the American Bad Ass. He came to the ring accompanied by the song by Kid Rock of the same name and then changed his song to Limp Biskit’s “Rollin’”. At Survivor Series 2003, Taker lost a “Buried Alive” match against Vince McMahon when Kane interfered on behalf of the Chairman of WWE. Undertaker haunted and taunted Kane with mysterious Titantron messages that led everyone to believe that he would come back as “The Deadman” and at Wrestlemania XX., he did just that and was again accompanied to the ring by Paul Bearer. He also went on to beat Kane in the match at Wrestlemania.

The Undertaker is one of the most respected men in the WWE locker room and has earned that respect as he worked for it during his 18 year tenure in the company. He is 15-0 at Wrestlemania matches and has beaten such wrestlers as Triple H, Ric Flair, Jake Roberts, Sid Vicious, King Kong Bundy, Randy Orton and an impressive list of others. He hopes to keep it going when he faces Edge at Wrestlemania XXIV on March 30, 2008. Will his streak go to 16-0 or will Edge finally put the streak “to rest”?