He had made plans to take a night off from the ring to attend an national amateur wrestling championship where his son Reid, now 11, was competing. WCW, forgetting about the time off, wanted Flair in Tallahassee. He didn t go. Court documents filed by WCW admitted that these story lines are planned out in advance and require the cooperation and participation of all involved wrestlers. This confession that professional wrestling follows a script caused a lot of ink to be spilled by sports writers across the country, but came as small surprise to fans.
Polls indicate that most wrestling fans don t care.
Flair hired Bill Diehl and filed a counter-suit, claiming that in fact he had no signed contract with WCW, only an unapproved letter of agreement. After a quarter-century in wrestling, he s still fit and unwilling to concede the ring to a younger generation. The WCW suit and Flair s countersuit dragged on for six months, keeping the wrestler out of the ring and out of the public eye. The wrestling public missed him. Fans mounted a campaign via the internet demanding his return and arranging boycotts of WCW events.