CHARLOTTE, N.C. (CHARLOTTE SPORTS LIVE) — “Who’s next?” was the question Bill Goldberg would ask in his wrestling days. But as to his football career, the better question to ask him would be, “Who’s first?”
“Oh yeah, that’s what I hang my hat on,” he smiles, shaking his head. “That is what people know me in Carolina for sure.”
He’s being sarcastic of course, but there is a bit of truth in what he’s saying. After all, Goldberg of all people is the surprising answer to a unique piece of Carolina Panthers history.
“I try to repress the bad things in my memory,” he explains. “I was with them for like three weeks.”
That’s because in fact, Bill Goldberg, WWE Hall of Famer, was the first player the Panthers ever cut.
“I didn’t keep in touch,” the 57-year-old said. “It was out of sight, out of mind thing. It was tough for me. It was really tough.”
It was the spring of 1995 and the Panthers under head coach Dom Capers were preparing for their inaugural season. Just a couple of months earlier they had taken Goldberg in the expansion draft, hoping the three-year defensive tackle could make an impact.
There was just one problem.
“I had just ripped my abdomen off my pelvis and I had to get it reattached,” he remembers. “I don’t think they had any knowledge of my surgery, and that is the reason the Falcons put me on the supplemental list.”
Goldberg was not the same player he once was and it didn’t take long for the Panthers to figure it out. However, interestingly enough, it was Goldberg who ultimately pulled the plug.
“I had no shot,” he admits. “I was just wasting my time.”
That was the beginning of the end of his football career. Within three years, he was a main event star in wrestling shows including some in Charlotte, which he admits wasn’t easy.
“It brought back my memories that weren’t too fond but I turned it on its head, right?” the four-time wrestling champion smiles. “I won that battle.”
Granted, there’s a part of him that still longs to play the game that was his first love. However, as far as consolation prizes go, this former Panther didn’t do all that bad.
“I had an autograph signing one time in Dallas, and Capers was like eight or nine people down from me,” he says laughing. “I signed an autograph for him and I sent it down then watched him look at it. It’s the funniest bewildering look I have ever seen in my life. Then the light went off and it was hilarious.”
Bill Goldberg was first alright.
But in a different line of work, he made it work, to become a legend.