He is widely regarded as one of the biggest stars of the Attitude Era[11] and one of the greatest wrestlers in the history of professional wrestling,[12] and headlined the 2000 edition of WWE's premier annual event, WrestleMania.

His main persona during his time in WCW and ECW from 1991 to 1996 was Cactus Jack, a dastardly, bloodthirsty and uncompromisingly physical brawler from Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, who wore cowboy boots and often used sharp metallic objects, such as barbed wire, thumbtacks, and trashcans.

When Foley first appeared in the WWF in 1996, he debuted the persona known as Mankind, an eerie, masochistic, mentally deranged lunatic who was masked and spent his spare time dwelling in mechanical rooms.

[19] In October 1983, while a student at the State University of New York at Cortland, Foley hitchhiked to Madison Square Garden to see his favorite wrestler, "Superfly" Jimmy Snuka, in a steel cage match against Don Muraco.

[20][21] Foley formally trained at Dominic DeNucci's wrestling school in Freedom, Pennsylvania, driving several hours weekly from his college campus in Cortland, New York.

After two years of relative obscurity on the independent circuit, Foley began receiving offers from various regional promotions, including Bill Watts' Universal Wrestling Federation (UWF).

[5][28][2] Foley's biggest match to date came in February 1990 against Mil Máscaras at Clash of the Champions X: Texas Shootout, where he took a particularly brutal bump backward off the 3 feet (0.91 m) high apron and landed on the concrete floor, with his head and back taking the impact.

[36] Unlike Jack's first stint in WCW, where his personality was quieter, he was now outwardly maniacal; laughing hysterically, shrieking into the air while choking his opponents and yelling his signature catchphrase "Bang-Bang!".

After spending a year and a half with WCW as a heel, Cactus Jack transitioned into a fan favorite after engaging in a feud with Paul Orndorff, Harley Race, and Big Van Vader.

Foley opted to wrestle and won his only championship in WCW, defeating the Nasty Boys in a "Broad Street Bully match" with Dave Schultz as the special guest referee.

During a promo, Cactus Jack spat on his title belt and threw it to the ground to appeal to the ECW fans who shunned the mainstream promotions, an act for which he was later forced to apologize to booker Ric Flair.

[5] Following successful defenses against the Nasty Boys and Harlem Heat, Cactus Jack and Sullivan lost the WCW World Tag Team Championship to Pretty Wonderful at Bash at the Beach in July 1994.

Funk returned to team up with Sandman, and during a particularly violent spot, the pair hit Cactus Jack with a kendo stick forty-six times in a barbed wire rope match.

Foley's last ECW match was against Whipwreck on March 9, 1996, at Big Ass Extreme Bash, and he recounts that he was not looking forward to it due to the increasingly hostile reactions he got even when he wasn't in character.

McMahon was not a fan of Cactus Jack and wanted to cover up Foley's face, so he was shown several designs for a new heel character–a man with a leather mask and chains, called "Mason the Mutilator".

", spoke to a rat named George, regularly took to acts of masochism (such as by pulling out his hair), and wore a mask seemingly constructed of oddly shaped pieces of leather that were patched together with rivets.

Combatants involved made use of everything from foreign objects to all sorts of exposed metal piping with large bolts, concrete flooring to solid electrical equipment, all allowed by the match's no disqualification and no count-out rules.

[50] On the April 1, 1996, episode of Monday Night Raw in San Bernardino, California, the day after WrestleMania XII, Mankind debuted on television and defeated Bob "Spark Plug" Holly, quickly moving into a feud with The Undertaker.

On the October 5 episode of Raw is War, while McMahon was in a hospital nursing wounds suffered at the hands of The Undertaker and Kane, Mankind arrived with a female clown called Yurple in an attempt to cheer him up.

During the match, Foley took several violent and dangerous bumps from The Rock all over the arena, including repeated steel chair shots to the head and a fall from the stands onto solid electrical objects, which sparked upon impact.

This feud culminated with a rematch at No Way Out in a Hell in a Cell match, where stipulations held that Cactus could not use foreign metallic objects he used in the Royal Rumble, and if he did not win the title, Foley had to retire from wrestling.

[57] Foley left for a few weeks, but returned at the request of Linda McMahon to wrestle for the title by replacing Chris Jericho's spot at the main event of WrestleMania 2000 against Triple H, The Rock and Big Show.

After WrestleMania, Foley made sporadic appearances on WWF programming throughout the middle of the year, at one point introducing Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura during a taping of Raw in the state as a foil to Mr. McMahon, as well as serving as the guest referee for the Earl Hebner versus Nick Patrick referee match and a tag-team bra and panties match between WWF wrestlers Lita and Trish Stratus vs. WCW wrestlers Stacy Keibler and Torrie Wilson at the Invasion pay-per-view.

Styles, Kazarian, Robert Roode, James Storm, Douglas Williams and Matt Morgan of Ric Flair's Fourtune stable, who thought they didn't deserve to be in TNA.

[90] At Bound for Glory on October 10, Foley was in EV 2.0's corner, when Dreamer, Raven, Rhino, Richards and Sabu defeated Fourtune members Styles, Kazarian, Morgan, Roode and Storm in a Lethal Lockdown match.

Foley returned to Raw on March 14, 2016, in a backstage segment with Dean Ambrose, in which he gave him a pep talk for his upcoming WrestleMania 32 match against Brock Lesnar and a passing of the torch in the form of his iconic barbed wire baseball bat, "Barbie".

The event was billed the "Total Xtreme Comedy show" and also featured comedians Brad Williams, Bret Ernst and Ring of Honor's Colt Cabana, who was also making his stand-up debut.

[140] In November 2010, Foley was a contestant on an all TNA week of Family Feud, teaming with Jay Lethal, Matt Morgan, Mr. Anderson and Rob Van Dam against Angelina Love, Christy Hemme, Lacey Von Erich, Tara and Velvet Sky.

The same month, Foley offered to mow anyone's lawn who donated at least $5,000 to the organization, stating, "If you want to help survivors of sexual assault, or just want to see a big guy with long hair mowing your lawn in front of your friends, please take part..."[148][149][150] Continuing his campaign for the organization, in May 2011, Foley auctioned off on eBay two famous items associated with his wrestling career: his Cactus Jack lace-up "leopard skin" boots (still embedded with 149 thumbtacks from his Impact match with Ric Flair); and the white shirt that he wore as Mankind during 1998's "Hell in a Cell" match, among other items.

[152] In a video uploaded to his official YouTube channel on October 23, 2024, Foley endorsed Kamala Harris for the 2024 presidential election after denouncing Donald Trump's threats to deploy the military to purge "the enemy from within".