Shawn Michaels Doesn’t Count WWE Crown Jewel As His Final Match

Shawn Michaels has explained why his match against The Undertaker at WrestleMania 26 was the final match for HBK.

After coming close to ending The Undertaker’s streak in an epic match at WrestleMania 25, Shawn Michaels put his career on the line to get another shot at The Deadman the following year. The match was another instant classic, but HBK still couldn’t get the job done, and one last Tombstone brought his legendary career to an end.

At least, until 2018, when Michaels made the ill-fated decision to come out of retirement to reform DX with Triple H one more time. At that year’s Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia, the pair went up against Kane & The Undertaker in a match that’s gone down in infamy, with botched moves and injury leading to it being widely panned by fans and critics alike. Even The Undertaker has admitted the match was a “trainwreck.”

It’s no surprise that Michaels would rather not count the match as the one he ended his career on, and in an interview with Chris Van Vliet, he claimed WrestleMania 26 was his true final bout.

“It’s that one with Undertaker [at WrestleMania 26]. Because the other one, it was a tag match, it was DX, and I feel kind of bad, because I don’t mean it in a negative way, but that was just sort of like, I don’t know. It was like Kiss going out, and not even with the original members or whatever, and playing a concert at The Troubadour or something.

“It was like, ‘Oh, but they’re not really retired,’ and I know Kiss never retired, just felt like a special, separate one-off. HBK and Mr. Wrestlemania, The Showstopper, whatever, that ended with Taker at WrestleMania, because I still came back and refereed the match between Hunter and Taker and again, and will always play a role in the WWE. Would it count if I went into the Rumble this year or something? Don’t get me wrong.”

Shawn Michaels Rules Out Competing In 2026 Royal Rumble

After mentioning the Royal Rumble, HBK was asked if we would see him getting back in the ring in Saudi Arabia in 2026, but Michaels gave a hard no to the idea.

”Oh, heavens no! Probably shouldn’t have said that. I was just using that as an example. But no, I don’t consider those a match. A single performance by me, by HBK, by that guy. That’s not who that was. That was a dude hanging out with his buddies and having a match. So one was the artist, the other one is was a dude, like I said, hanging out with his buddies.”

Would you like to see Shawn Michaels wrestle one more time? Or should he have left his boots in the closet after WrestleMania 26? Let us know your thoughts below!

H/T to Fightful for the above transcription.