Ric Flair, one of professional wrestling’s most iconic and influential figures, was hospitalized over the weekend for an undisclosed medical issue and underwent a successful surgery on Monday, ESPN reports. A representative from WWE, which still works with the 68-year-old Flair, told ESPN he was put into a medically induced coma before the procedure and is now “resting.” After tweeting on Saturday that Flair had been admitted for “routine monitoring,” his agent Melinda Morris Zanoni later sent out a message that made the situation sound far more dire:
Yesterday, after the surgery, she clarified that it wasn’t heart related, but did not specify any further details. On Facebook, “Mean” Gene Okerlund, the mustachioed interviewer who famously sparred with Flair and his contemporaries, mentioned The Nature Boy had undergone colon surgery, but this has yet to be confirmed. Longtime wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer reported that while Flair is out of surgery, the situation is still “extremely serious.”