"My career's over" - Former WWE Universal Champion recalls freaking out about 'career-ending' neck injury

A popular former WWE Universal Champion recently talked about his brutal neck injury that nearly 'ended' his wrestling career. The star also revealed how Stone Cold Steve Austin helped him in recovering. The name in question is Braun Strowman.

On May 1, 2023, Braun Strowman teamed up with Ricochet to lock horns with Chad Gable and Otis in a Tag Team Match. At one point in the bout, The Monster of All Monsters suffered a brutal neck injury and seemingly struggled to finish the match. Later, Strowman revealed that he needed to undergo surgery and didn't know when or if he would be able to return to the ring. Thankfully, the former Universal Champion recovered from the setback and returned to WWE television in May 2024.

During a recent interview on TMZ's Inside The Ring, Braun Strowman recalled his 'career-ending' neck injury, saying that he was paralyzed for a few seconds during the match against The Alpha Academy.

Strowman also mentioned that he thought his wrestling career was over because of the excruciating pain and numbness in his fingers before his surgery.

"Alright, so I'll give you the quick rundown on it. So 2023, I had that really bad neck injury in the ring where I pinched my spine and both my arms went limp, were paralyzed for about three seconds during the match... To get the match done, get in the back, the doctors check me out, [and] we're trying to figure out what's going on... So I'm literally freaking out of, 'Oh my God, my career's over, my day-to-day life's over,'" he said.

The Monster of All Monsters added that his injury was similar to Stone Cold Steve Austin's setback that 'ended' the latter's career. Strowman also mentioned that he reached out to the legend for advice and was told he should go ahead with the surgery.

"Thankfully, I'm really close with Stone Cold Steve Austin. This injury was really, really similar to the injury that ended his career, so I called Steve, talked to Steve a lot, man, he gave me a lot of reassurance and eased my mind with, have the surgery, he's had great success afterwards, no issues and stuff like that. WWE took great care of me, got me down to Andrews Medical, got me patched up, they threw a metal plate, four screws in there, so my time off, I had like a year or whatever to recover from that," he added.

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Braun Strowman is no longer signed with WWE

Braun Strowman's last in-ring appearance came on the April 18, 2025, edition of WWE SmackDown, where he teamed up with LA Knight to defeat Jacob Fatu and Solo Sikoa. The former Wyatt Family member was then told his contract would end in July 2025, and WWE wasn't planning to renew it.

Despite not being under contract with the company, The Monster of All Monsters will host a TV series, Everything on the Menu with Braun Strowman, set to premiere on October 24, 2025, on the USA Network. It will be interesting to see if Strowman will ever return to WWE in the future.

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Please credit TMZ's Inside The Ring and give an H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling if you use quotes from the first half of this article.