Ken Shamrock is considered to be one of the greatest mixed martial artists of all time. Not only that, but he also enjoyed a successful career in professional wrestling. In this article, we’ll take a look into his career and Ken Shamrock’s net worth in 2021.
| Net Worth | $1.5 million |
| Age | 57 |
| Salary | Retired |
| Sponsors | N/A |
| Profession | MMA Fighter |
Ken Shamrock’s Net Worth in 2021 (estimate): $1.5 million
Ken Shamrock’s net worth in 2021 is estimated by Celebrity Net Worth to be at $1.5 million.
Known as one of the greatest fighters in the industry, Shamrock started training as a professional wrestler in 1988. He made his debut in 1989 under the Atlantic Coast Wrestling promotion.
In 1990, Shamrock passed a series of tryouts to join the Japanese Universal Wrestling Federation under the name “Wayne Shamrock”. Unfortunately, the UWF failed to stay afloat, and Shamrock followed his fellow wrestlers to the Pro Wrestling Fujiwara Gumi promotion.
Following their stint with Fujiwara Gumi, Shamrock and his fellow wrestlers started their own promotion called Pancrase Hybrid Wrestling — a mixed martial arts promotion that primarily uses the rules of professional wrestling.
Shamrock made his MMA debut on the first Pancrase show on September 21, 2003, as he got the win via submission after using the arm-triangle choke.
In December 1994, Ken Shamrock became the first foreign champion in Japanese MMA history as he outlasted every competitor in the 16-man King of Pancrase Tournament to be named the first King of Pancrase.
Unfortunately, Shamrock had a falling out with the Pancrase management in 1996, as he decided to leave the company with a record of 17–3.
Shamrock then signed with the newly-formed fighting promotion in the USA called the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He initially thought it was a professional wrestling event, and he realized it was going to be real fighting after the first bout of the one-night tournament UFC 1.
He won his first bout in the UFC against Patrick Smith after making him submit via a heel hook. Shamrock then faced Royce Gracie in the next round. Unfortunately, Shamrock lost against Gracie after the latter forced the former to submit.
The ending of the fight was controversial as the referee didn’t see Shamrock tap out and ordered the two fighters to continue fighting. Shamrock declined to continue after he admitted to the ref that he tapped out.
Ken Shamrock and Royce Gracie had their rematch at UFC 5 on April 5, 1995, dubbed “The Superfight”. However, the UFC suddenly enforced a 30-minute time limit due to pay per view concerns. Both fighters fought for the duration of the match, and 5 minutes of overtime, before the bout was declared a draw.
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Shamrock expressed his interest to fight Gracie for a third time, claiming that he was not satisfied with his performance and saying that it’s not a win and they didn’t gain anything from the draw.
He then won the UFC Superfight Championship (now the UFC Heavyweight Championship) at UFC 6 after he forced Dan Severn to tap out via a choke.
Senator John McCain successfully pulled out UFC pay-per-view broadcasts from multiple cable providers which put a major dent in the pay-per-view revenue. With this development, Ken Shamrock decided to pursue professional wrestling as he signed with the World Wrestling Federation.
Shamrock made his WWF debut on February 24, 1997, in an episode of Monday Night Raw. He then developed a rivalry with Bret Hart and The Hart Foundation throughout 1997.
He eventually won the WWF Championship in the main event of D-Generation X: In Your house when he defeated Shawn Michaels via disqualification when Triple H interfered with the match.
Shamrock departed the WWF in 1999 to resume his MMA career. However, he still made stops in professional wrestling from 2002 until 2021 with various promotions such as the Independent Circuit, Total Nonstop Action Wrestling, New Japan Pro-Wrestling, and Impact Wrestling.
After his stint with the WWF, Ken Shamrock signed with Pride Fighting Championships. His MMA comeback fight was at Pride Grand Prix 2000 Finals where he fought, and defeated, Alexander Otsuka via knockout.
On November 22, 2002, Ken Shamrock returned to the octagon at UFC 40 to settle his feud with Tito Ortiz. Their rivalry began to brew in 1999 after a series of trash talks between Ortiz and Shamrock’s fighter with the Lion’s Den.
In the fight, Shamrock nearly KO’d Ortiz in round 1. However, Ortiz recovered and began to dominate the match with a series of takedowns and ground-and-pound attacks. Before the start of round 4, Shamrock’s corner threw in the towel as Ortiz successfully defended his UFC Light Heavyweight Championship.
Shamrock fought Ortiz two more times in 2006, both fights resulted in a loss for him.
He fought his last MMA fights under Bellator. His first fight was against Kimbo Slice at Bellator 134. Unfortunately, Shamrock lost via TKO after Slice caught him with this signature powerful right hook at 2:22 in the first round.
His last fight was against longtime rival Royce Gracie for their trilogy bout. Shamrock lost once again via TKO in the first round.
Ken Shamrock, along with Royce Gracie, became the first-ever inductees into the UFC Hall of Fame on November 21, 2003.
In July 2019, Shamrock announced via his Facebook page that he is retiring and he has no plans of fighting again. In the same month, Shamrock announced that he would begin his own bare-knuckle promotion named “Valor”.
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Ken Shamrock also appeared in various films, TV shows, and video games. He was a regular part of multiple WWF/WWE and UFC video games. He also appeared in an episode of the sitcom That 70’s Show and a few movies along with movie stars Danny Trejo, Russell Crowe, and Denzel Washington.
Ken Shamrock has had a long career, and he definitely left his mark in the industry.
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