Mick Foley Says He Nearly Lost His Good Ear In Legendary IWA Japan Deathmatch With Terry Funk
Mick Foley says he nearly lost his good ear during his King of the Deathmatch Finals against Terry Funk in 1995.
It’s well known that Mick Foley lost his ear in 1994 when wrestling Vader in Germany. Shortly thereafter, he would leave WCW, in part due to his feeling that they had not capitalized on the gruesome injury. In 1995, he found himself wrestling in IWA Japan, facing Terry Funk in the finals of a tournament that would later be known as the King of the Deathmatch tournament.
He recently rewatched that match for a video on D-Von Dudley’s YouTube channel, revealing that he almost lost his good ear during the match because of a specific bump, which he chose not to go through with and instead cut his ear on some of the barbed wire surrounding the ring.
“I nearly lost my good ear because I chickened out. This bump was supposed to be the F-Troop bump, where I was supposed to go flying over the guardrail, and I got scared. In getting scared, I nearly lost my good ear, because I was like, ‘I don’t think I could take that bump,’ and put the brakes on a good two feet before I should have and, yeah, I needed, I think, 15 or 16 stitches behind the ear that I still had.”
One incident that Mick Foley did not chicken out on was being thrown off the Hell in a Cell structure by The Undertaker. Learn more about his feelings regarding that legendary moment here.
Mick Foley recently hinted at stepping away from the spotlight after one final tour in 2028 to mark 30 years since his Hell in a Cell match with The Undertaker at WWE King of the Ring 1998. Learn more about that here.
If you use any of the above quotes, please credit D-Von Dudley’s YouTube channel in addition to linking back to this article and giving Fightful credit for transcription.
