WINC Watchlist: Sting's Greatest Matches, Ranked

Sting is one of the most celebrated professional wrestlers of all time, and for good reason. He had a career spanning 39 years, winning championships in nearly every promotion he worked for, and has inspired so many of today's athletes that certain matches you see in companies like WWE, AEW, or TNA wouldn't look the same had it not been for "The Icon."

After wrestling in five different decades, and having already going through one retirement in the 2010s that was brought about by a serious neck injury, Sting finally hung up his boots and baseball bat in 2024. He has made cameo appearances here and there, mainly in AEW to help out his old friend and tag team partner Darby Allin, but he has also been a regular face on the convention circuit where his meet-and-greet lines are always a little longer than most of the other famous faces in attendance. Sting will likely appear at more conventions down the line, but he will appear as Steve Borden going forward as he retired his iconic face paint in 2025. With that said, the paint may or may not come back in the future now that his son, Steven Borden Jr., has started his own wrestling journey.

With his face paint now officially gone, the Sting character has gone with it, but his career was so long and storied that it's only right that we take a look over it and identify some of the matches that made children around the world "Little Stingers." Sting was involved in some thrilling matches in the NWA, WCW, TNA, AEW and New Japan Pro Wrestling (not in WWE though, that run was anything but thrilling), so narrowing this watchlist down to just five matches was a challenge in itself. The man himself always used to say that "The only thing that's for sure about Sting is that nothing's for sure," but we are sure that these are the five greatest matches in the career of the man called Sting.

To anyone reading this who believes that in order for a match to be considered good that it needs to be long, please turn your attention to this match.

1992 is often considered to be the greatest year for WCW from an in-ring standpoint. While it might not be as popular as a 1997 for example where the company was kicking WWE from pillar to post on Monday nights, the company had a roster that would go out every night and put on some of the best wrestling you could find anywhere in the world. At the top of the card, you would usually find Sting in what was by far his best year on all fronts, and going into the Beach Blast pay-per-view, he was sitting pretty as the WCW World Heavyweight Champion.

In between the battles he had with The Dangerous Alliance and Big Van Vader, he ran into the most unpredictable wrestler of his day, Cactus Jack. He might be seen as a lovable teddy bear to most fans these days, but Mick Foley was the definition of unhinged in his run with WCW, and was known for putting himself through unimaginable pain as long as the man he was facing ended up being worse off. Sting and Jack had already crossed paths a number of times months prior to Beach Blast, but as Vader loomed in the future, Sting put his championship aside for one night to try and beat Jack at his own game; violence.

This Falls Count Anywhere match is not like the matches of the same name that you see today. It's not another way of describing a Hardcore match that's filled with plunder, it's an arena-sized brawl where two men will stop at nothing in order to put an end to their opponent. Jack enters first, and in a great little detail, he doesn't even get in the ring, he waits on his knees on the entrance ramp for Sting as he knows that is where he will win the match. Sting on the other hand, being the generational babyface he was at the time, tried to keep the match as clean as possible in the early going by doing legitimate wrestling movies. 

Naturally, that didn't last long as Jack would do his patented dives off the apron to the concrete floor. Sting sold a rib injury caused by Vader perfectly when Suplexing Jack in the crowd, and even the chair shots to the back have a little more venom behind them than what most WCW fans were used to seeing. The match comes full circle when they get back to the ramp, and Sting uses his big match experience to get the win in under 12 minutes. No wasted motion, all killer no filler, whatever you want to call it. This match went full speed from the opening bell and really is one of Sting's (and Jack's) greatest matches.

Limiting this watchlist to a top five was always going to be tricky considering the length and quality of Sting's career, and one of the casualties of only picking five matches is that I can't include the entire trilogy between Sting and Big Van Vader from WCW in 1992 and 1993. 

The first match at The Great American Bash in July 1992 will cater more to those who like a little more tragedy in their wrestling as it's Vader who comes away with the victory, despite Sting getting within inches of finally figuring out how to take the big man out. Vader also wins the third and final match at SuperBrawl 3 in February 1993, which was a Strap Match that, despite having an ending that a number of people weren't happy with then or now, is one of the best WCW matches of 1993, and is a prime example of how to do a Strap Match right. It's very clear that Bryan Danielson took some inspiration from SuperBrawl 3 when it came to putting together his Strap Matches with Bray Wyatt and Ricky Starks in WWE and AEW respectively.

With all that said, it's the second of the three matches that lands itself on this watchlist. As previously mentioned, Sting was so close to getting the victory at The Great American Bash, and the mammoth jigsaw puzzle that was Big Van Vader still needed to be solved. The thing is, Sting actually had all of the pieces that he did the first time around but the puzzle still couldn't be solved. As this match went on it hit him, Vader had the remaining pieces and he needed to get "The Mastodon" to slip up in order to get those pieces. Sting would continue to hit high impact moves to wear the big man down, but in the end, it was Vader making careless errors that led to his downfall.

Sting forced Vader into making mistakes that caused "The Mastodon" to overcompensate his own strategy, but that played right into Sting's hands. Vader put extra force his signature moves that ended up making him more tired than usual, and right as he thought he would be able to land the all important killing blow, Sting activated his trap and got the all important victory, and revenge for the loss at The Great American Bash. Sting would win the "King of Cable" tournament by beating Vader, which isn't relevant as anything other than the pride of the TBS Superstation was on the line, but Vader would bounce back in style by winning the WCW World Championship from Ron Simmons two days later.

Sting and Vader had electric chemistry when they stepped in the ring together, and all three of their matches from this feud are worth watching in their own right. However, it's the battle at Starrcade 1992 that stands out to me as the best match the two men ever had together.

It's the match that took a young Steve Borden from being just another promising young talent on the NWA roster, to being the man that turn millions of people around the United States into wrestling fans. Sting had only been part of the NWA for around one year by the time the first Clash of the Champions event took place in March 1988, but from the moment he transitioned over from the UWF, everyone knew that they had a future star on their hands. He quickly rose through the ranks and began challenging Ric Flair for the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship at house shows, but he would always lose or come away with a disqualification victory. However, that would all be preparation for this match.

To say there was a lot of pressure on Sting would be an understatement. The first-ever Clash of the Champions would go head-to-head with WWE WrestleMania 4 as a way for the NWA and Jim Crockett Promotions to fight back against Vince McMahon's underhanded tactics of counterprograming Starrcade and the Bunkhouse Stampede with the inaugural editions of Survivor Series and the Royal Rumble. The show would be broadcast on free television while WrestleMania 4 would be on pay-per-view, meaning that a lot more eyes would be on Sting's title match with "The Nature Boy," and throw in the fact that he had only been a professional wrestler for three years at the time to make things even more important.

In spite of all of that pressure, and the weight of an entire promotion on his shoulders, the gamble worked as this match is seen as one of the best for both Sting and Flair. It starts out like many would have suspected, Flair not really taking his opponent seriously and knowing that after all of the 60 minute matches he had done up until that point, he could go all night if he wanted to whereas Sting likely couldn't. However, as the clock gradually ticked by and Sting started to grow in confidence, both Flair and the crowd in the Greensboro Coliseum realized in real time that there was a chance, no matter how small, that Sting could actually win this match.

Despite all the punishment he sustained, including wrestling a large portion of the match on one good leg, Sting swung things in his favor as the match neared its end. The moment where Sting fires up through Flair's chops is engrained into the minds of fans around the world to this day, and when Flair gets locked in the Scorpion Death Lock in the closing seconds the building sounds like it's going to take off with how loud it is. Flair managed to survive and the match ended in a 45 minute time limit draw, but it didn't matter. Sting was a made man after this night, and even though it happened in 1988, this match still holds up.

Completing the 1992 trilogy of matches for this watchlist (or quadrilogy if you want to include both his 1992 matches against Big Van Vader) is this, quite possibly the greatest WarGames match in the history of the business and one of the best bouts that WCW ever produced. We talked about this in our WarGames watchlist that we did before Survivor Series last year but it bares repeating, WarGames is a very simple match to book. The heels must have the advantage, there must be enough blood to give transfusions to everyone backstage, and the chaos must not stop until one member of a team simply says "I literally can't do this for one second longer." Out of every WarGames match that has ever happened, this is the gold standard.

While this is a watchlist dedicated to Sting, you can't talk about this match without giving flowers to everyone else involved. Steve Austin and Barry Windham are the iron men of the match, kicking things off for their respective teams and bleeding basically from the opening bell. The roar from the crowd when Ricky Steamboat and Dustin Rhodes enter the match is deafening, with Rhodes' introduction being coupled with Sting climbing to the top of the cage to prevent Madusa from giving The Dangerous Alliance an even bigger advantage. Rick Rude and Arn Anderson clean house for the heels, Nikita Koloff pledges his loyalty to the Squadron, and both Larry Zybszko and Bobby Eaton mean well, but they end up being the weak links for their team when all is said and done.

As for Sting's performance, this is "Surfer Sting" at the peak of his powers. He is on fire when he enters the match, pulling off one of the most impressive feats of strength you'll see anywhere by Gorilla Pressing Rick Rude above his head, causing Rude's back to hit the roof of the cage repeatedly. When people talk about how big of babyface someone like John Cena was, go back and watch Sting in this match and realize that Cena really was Sting for his generation. Every movement, physical or non-physical, got a reaction from the crowd. Sting could probably push every member of the crowd down a flight of stairs and they would still cheer for him in this match, he is just that guy in WCW.

There is a real sense of urgency, even throughout the two minute intervals, that you don't get with modern WarGames matches. AEW might have the blood side of things nailed down, but there is an energy running through this match, especially when it gets to "The Match Beyond" where everyone realizes that they need to end this now before things get too out of hand. You just don't get that with any modern version of this stipulation. Truly an iconic match with one of the best Sting performances you will see at any point in his career. Perfection.

In many aspects of life, it's how you finish something that leaves more of an impression on people than anything you could have done before. Up until AEW Revolution 2024, Sting had been a professional wrestler for nearly 40 years. He had countless classic matches (just look at the rest of this watchlist for example), won dozens of championships all over the world, and earned himself a legion of hardcore fans who followed him from company to company. But everything has to come to an end at some point, and if you can end something on a high note, there isn't anything quite like it, and in the case of Sting's career, he went out on the highest possible note.

Until Hiroshi Tanahashi retired from wrestling at NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20, you would be hard pressed to find a retirement match better than Sting's, where he and Darby Allin defended the AEW World Tag Team Championships in a Tornado Tag Team Match against The Young Bucks. The whole presentation from start to finish is just one big celebration of "The Icon" and it's wonderful. Sting sitting in a movie theater watching all of the clips from his career that aren't owned by WWE, "Seek and Destroy" by Metallica blaring out of the speakers one more time, and the two cherries on the icing on the already huge cake, Sting's sons coming out dressed as previous versions of their dad gets you right in the mood for one last ride with "The Stinger."

That last ride turned out to be one of the most exciting and chaotic in AEW history. Of course it was going to be over the top given that Darby was in the match, but even the most experienced AEW fans didn't expect him to launch himself head first from the top of a ladder through a pane of glass on the outside. Even Sting at 64 years of age went through a pane of glass as Matthew and Nicholas Jackson looked to spoil the party that was the last match for "The Icon." They pulled out every trick in the book, even giving both Ric Flair and Ricky Steamboat Superkicks for trying to get involved, but it turned out that Sting didn't need their help.

Everyone went into this match believing that Sting would have to lose as it would make sense for The Young Bucks to parade around, not just as champions, but as the men who sent Sting into retirement. However, as the match went on, more and more people believed that "The Icon" wasn't going to go gently into that good night, and he didn't. Sting locked in the Scorpion Death Lock on Matthew for the victory, and he was given a send-off fitting of a man who is one of the most influential performers of all time. Sting saved the best for last in his career, and his retirement match is essential viewing.