Slam!! Crash!! The sounds of pro wrestling, a.k.a. sports entertainment. Sports entertainment is a world that is not looked at with a serious eye. Most people consider it to be some sort of sideshow, a pathetic attempt at strong drama or action. The common conception is that pro-wrestling is a fake, effortless "sport" done by neanderthalic titans. They seem to think that everything is scripted out before and that it takes no effort at all to be a good pro wrestler. The theory that pro wrestling is a simplistic form of entertainment, which is fake, couldn't be further from the truth. In contrast, pro wrestling is a complex "sport" that couples harsh physicality with creative improvisation.

While many people think that pro wrestling is completely fake, the exact opposite is true. Pro wrestling is about as real as one can get. The endings might be scripted, but the wrestling itself is far more physical than football or basketball or any other so-called real sport. People think that the two wrestlers just go out there, punch and kick at air, and then go home. Before going home, the wrestlers usually complete a lot of extremely dangerous maneuvers. A good example of the danger involved is the hardcore style. This style commonly involves the use of barbed wire ropes, cages, glass, tables, baseball bats, electric tools, chairs, baseball bats covered in barbed wire, explosive cages, explosive barbed wire mats, fire, boards of nails, scythes, bricks covered with barbed wire, branding irons, piranhas, scorpions, chairs on fire, coffins filled with dry ice, cacti, electric cages, log cabins made out of long-style light bulbs, and in some small cases popcorn. It is really hard to fake a match consisting of explosives or barbed wire or another hardcore element. In one match between Terry Funk and Mr. Pogo, a barbed wire rope, explosive barbed wire mat, double hell match, Terry Funk knocked Mr. Pogo off of the ring apron onto the explosive barbed wire below. Mr. Pogo suffered burns and was nearly paralyzed when he hit the C4 explosives, thus proving that there is much risk involved with this type of style. Even when there are not overt signs of the hardcore style, like the ones I mentioned above, this style involves taking certain wrestling maneuvers to the extreme. While the average wrestler may do a powerbomb, a maneuver involving one wrestler being raised into the air and dropped onto his back, on his opponent, the hardcore wrestler will do the powerbomb off of a second story balcony. While the average wrestling may do an elbow drop, a maneuver involving a wrestler leaping off of the top rope and landing on his hips, knees, and elbow, onto his opponent from the top rope to the mat, the hardcore wrestler will do the elbow drop from the top rope to the concrete floor below. Another example of the risk involved took place during a series of matches between Cactus Jack and Vader earlier this decade. Although there were no overt hardcore elements in these matches, both men wrestled in a stiff, hardcore style and bore the fruit of that style. During the matches Cactus Jack would perform several elbow drops to the concrete floor below and, at one point, Vader dropped his whole 400-pound physique on top of Cactus Jack. Both men came out with major injuries, such as Cactus Jack losing one ear and half of another. The hardcore style is extremely risky and the people who wrestle in such a style are putting their bodies on the line almost every match.

Even the matches where the wrestlers do not wrestle in the hardcore style are physically taxing. Contrary to prevailing opinion, the great majority of wrestling maneuvers, in fact, do exact some amount of pain on the wrestlers. The lucha style, which originated from Mexico and is a very aerial style, involves many moves being done off the top rope. These moves usually end up hurting the knees and hips of the wrestlers upon impact. For one wrestler, he has a 200 or 300 pound man hurtling through the air with the intent to land on top of him. For the other man, he is leaping off of a structure many feet into the air and landing onto the mat or unforgiving ground below. For less air-based attacks, the back is usually the focal point of the pressure and pain. In a lot of maneuvers, such as the powerbomb and vertical suplex, the wrestlers angle themselves so they can take the fall onto the meatiest part of their back. In these moves one of the wrestlers in lifted several feet into the air and dropped onto the mat. It is impossible to fake a five-foot drop. This consistent pounding, while perhaps not being so much one move at a time, wears down the back over time. Many wrestlers, such as Mankind, have to take a lot of painkillers just to wrestle a match, because their back is in so much pain. Tom Billington, a.k.a. The Dynamite Kid, is currently paralyzed and in a wheelchair, the effect of a legendary wrestling career that involved many risks. After years of taking blow upon blow to his back, it just broke down and he lost use of parts of his body. In even the most basic of matches, there is much risk involved. If the moves are done incorrectly great personal injury can be caused. In a match between D'Lo Brown and Droz, earlier this year, D'Lo went to powerbomb Droz and screwed up the move. Droz ended up landing on his head and neck region and being paralyzed for that unfortunate miscue. He will never return to wrestling again. One maneuver, one simple move, that is screwed up, could spell the end for even the most lucrative wrestling career.

In addition to the moves being painful, there is little respite. While most athletes stop doing their athletic events if they get injured, pro wrestlers have to continue to wrestle through the trials and tribulations of constant pain. In a match between Mitsuhiro Misawa and Toshiaki Kawada during January of 99, Toshiaki Kawada broke his forearm in the first five minutes of the match when he used it to punch Mitsuhiro Misawa in the head. Instead of stopping the bout, Kawada wrestled for another twenty or so minutes, using the arm and taking many falls onto it. Shawn Michaels wrestled for several months with two displaced disks in his back, after taking one too many bumps. He had a big-time match coming up at the big WWF Par-Per-View WrestleMania and could not take time off to heal, even though he was in massive amounts of pain. Pro wrestling is a callous sport that continually beats up the body. The list of wrestlers who have had to have major surgeries is long and includes such popular names as Hulk Hogan, Stone Cold Steve Austin, and Kevin Nash.

It is no shock to anyone that the matches are fixed. The wrestlers know the outcome of the match before it takes place, but there is more to it than that. Most people think that everything is scripted out and that the wrestlers just have to follow a simple formula. While a few wildly important matches have been scripted out beforehand, most matches are improvised. Wrestling is a lot like a jazz solo. The promoters tell the wrestlers who they want to win and if there are any big moves that they may want the wrestlers to do, which, under the analogy, would be like the chord changes. The powers that be give the wrestlers a skeleton program to work with in the match and then they put their own stamp upon it. This leads into the building block of a good wrestling match: psychology. Since wrestling is essentially a fixed sport, the wrestlers want to make the match seem as logical as possible, as if it were a real sport, where the two competitors were not working together. This is where psychology comes in. Psychology is the effort to make the match seem as real as possible. This includes wrestlers working over a body part to stop their opponent's big finisher or learning from an opponent's maneuver that took place earlier in the match and then countering it later in the match. In a late-98 match between Kenta Kobashi and Mitsuhiro Misawa, there is a really good example of psychology. There is a powerbomb series throughout the 43-minute match where both wrestlers continue to build off of a single powerbomb done early in the match by Kobashi onto Misawa. Later in the match, Kobashi attempts to powerbomb Misawa again and Misawa tries to counter the move into a huricanrana, but Kobashi counters that move into a Boston Crab. That spot of moves is trying to say that Misawa saw the powerbomb coming and, having learned from his earlier encounter with the powerbomb, tried to counter the move. Kobashi, thinking that perhaps Misawa would attempt to counter this move, countered the countermove into the Boston Crab. The series extended further into the match, when Kobashi figures out a safe way to powerbomb Misawa without Misawa being able to counter it and then Misawa finally figuring out how to counter the "safe" Kobashi powerbomb to come up with the win. Another example of psychology took place during a match in early 1998 between Lance Storm and Rob Van Dam. Since Rob Van Dam wrestles in a very aerial style, Lance Storm tried to ground RVD by attacking his knees. Lance continually sent kick after dropkick to the knee region, so as to keep RVD from taking to the air. It would make sense that Lance, in the context of his fear for the strong aerial moves of RVD, would want to keep RVD away from his most powerful attacks, such as his finisher, the Frog Splash. To accomplish this, one would want to injure the knees and legs of RVD, and that is exactly what Lance Storm did. What does all this mumbo jumbo mean? It means that wrestlers not only don't have the match scripted out beforehand for them, but they can't also just randomly do moves to each other out there. Just as a saxophonist cannot play random notes on a solo and expect it to sound good, the wrestlers have to construct a match. In a jazz solo, the soloist, if he is good, is either going somewhere or coming from somewhere. In wrestling, the theory is the same. They have build a match up to a dazzling crescendo, where the finisher and pin take place, and they have to more or less do it while the match is taking place. This involves a lot of quick thinking and good timing, traits which all the best wrestlers have in carloads.

Pro wrestling is easily not given its due in America today. It is far tougher than any of the "real sports". In addition to the fact that wrestlers have to endure a lot to be good in the sport, they get little to no respect from the mainstream media. The media is the one continuing to perpetrate the myths and misconceptions about pro wrestling. If it could come to light about how hardworking pro wrestlers are and how much work and thought goes into the match, even if it might be on the spot, these misconceptions would disappear. The misconceptions are false. Pro wrestling is a physical, yet mental sport that commands an intense work ethic. When it is done right, though, it is a masterpiece. The myths might not bear it out, but the greatest matches in pro wrestling history all read like Charles Dickens, look like the Mona Lisa, and sound like Charlie Parker.

Anyway, if you have any comments, concerns, complaints, or questions or just wanna chat about how I definitely need to get an A on this paper, then please email me at talboito@uclink4.berkeley.edu