Sting Reveals The Wrestling Legend Who Came Up With His Bright Face Paint And Iconic Look

For a very long time, the professional wrestling icon known as Sting has donned black and white face paint with a foreboding look. He would also have on a black trench coat and carry around a black bat, and that was a look he adopted during the time of the New World Order in WCW. Before that, he wore glowing ring gear and even had bright face paint that made him stand out above the rest, but that look wasn’t even his own idea.

For years in World Championship Wrestling, Sting had the surfer look, which made him stand out, and it worked for him. He had bleached-blond hair and bright face paint which made everyone’s focus go straight to him in dim-lit arenas and rings.

Sting recently took some time to speak with Bill Apter of Apter Chat and the legend said he would have loved to go back to that look. As his career went on, though, he stayed as the version of Sting modeled after “The Crow” because it was what worked.

“The Crow character by the time it came alive and hit the scene and evolved to what it turned into, it would’ve never made sense to go back to the blond flat-top haircut,” Sting said. “Even if I wanted to, there’s not enough hair on my head to do that anymore. So I just couldn’t pull it off. But let me tell you something, if I thought I could pull it off, I would’ve attempted it in these later years. Because so many people talked about it and they’re so nostalgic about it. And WrestleMania 31 is a big example of that with DX and nWo and people just freaked out over that.”

Some of the more longtime wrestling fans can remember when Sting first introduced the black and white look by hanging out in the rafters of WCW arenas.

Upon finally arriving in WWE, the look of “The Crow” is the one that Sting continued with, and it worked for the casual and newer fans. Even though he would have loved to go back to his bright nostalgic look, Sting did admit that he wasn’t the one who came up with it.

As transcribed by Wrestling Inc., Sting revealed that another wrestling legend came up with his bright surfer look and it appears as if he did it on the fly.

“They put Ric (Flair) with Ricky Morton, and Ricky gets hurt. So Dusty says, ‘Stinger baby, I want to put some color on your face, color on your tights and color on your boots. And I want to put you with Ric.’ So we did a little story line with JJ Dillon and the Four Horseman and Ric Flair in Raleigh, North Carolina for a TV taping. It was no real heat angle, we just kind of did our thing and it took off. So Dusty is the real reason why the color started to begin with.”

For those who personally knew Dusty Rhodes, or anyone who was a fan of his, this description of the conversations seems spot-on. It just seems like the way that Rhodes would have spoken and it is yet another brilliant creation from his incredible wrestling mind.

It certainly does seem as if the world has seen the final match out of the man known as Sting, but anything is possible. Chances are that he won’t ever wrestle again due to his age and injuries, but longtime WCW and WWE fans would have loved to see the bright face paint and blond flat top of “The Stinger” one more time. The good thing is that a lot of fans lived through it and Dusty Rhodes is the man who deserves the credit.