A Double Stinger

 While I have been a fan of wrestling going back in to the 1980s I was never a fan of Sting. I didn’t have anything against him I just didn’t know much about him until I started watching WCW Wrestling in the late 1990s but after that point I'm a fan. 

When the WWF (WWE) bought out WCW in 2001 several of WCW’s top wrestlers moved over to TNA including Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Kurt Angle and Sting. During the TNA Impact years TriStar had the exclusive license of the brand and I think they did an amazing job, I had talked about their products a number of times during the early years of my blog. 

One night a few weeks ago I was doing a search of some wrestling cards and eventually ended up looking at Sting’s cards and was immediately drawn to this 2009 TNA Impact Sting Face Paint card. Tristar used Sting’s face paint to spell out his name on the card front. It isn’t actually wrestling used paint but I am guessing from a can of the face paint his uses. 

I had tweeted about it after I won it because the price was extremely low and after I bought the card the seller put it back up for auction. I was worried because the price was well under the going price and the seller was new, so I feared he changed his mind and was going to cancel my purchase. I emailed him and he assured me it was relisted by accident and that he would be sending the card.  

About a day or two later, while still stuck on Sting cards, I found this baseball bat relic card from the 2008 TNA Cross The Line release. If you are not familiar with Sting’s character, he would often carry a black baseball bat during his later WCW and TNA career which he would occasionally use as a weapon. You wouldn’t expect a bat in a wrestling release, but here you go. 

Donruss was well known for their detailed information about the relics that they used in cards, including images of the specific item too. Tristar’s guarantee takes it one step further not only saying when the bat was used, but how. Sting struck Samoa Joe with the bat at the Victory Road pay-per-view during Samoa Joe’s bout against Booker T.