|
| Article: |
Author |
| HOLY SHOOT! |
David West & Michael Campbell |
At TNA Lockdown, Kurt Angle and Samoa Joe reinvented pro wrestling with a new, MMA-inspired style...
The hybrid MMA/pro wrestling match between Kurt and Joe at TNA Lockdown caused controversy among almost every strata of fight fan. Message boards lit up like Christmas trees, as wrestling traditionalists balked at the "fake MMA fight" while open-minded fans called it the next step in the evolution of pro wrestling.
Once upon a time, wrestling was a simulation of a fight; today, it is a "sports entertainment" spectacle that bears little resemblance to real combat. So is there any want or need for a more realistic, UFC-inspired wrestling match in 2008? We asked MMA fighter and journalist David West, and pro wrestling writer Michael Campbell to deconstruct the match…
THE MMA PERSPECTIVE
by David West
The heyday of shoot wrestling was at the turn of the 19th Century, when Frank Gotch and Farmer Burns toured the American heartland taking on all comers with hefty wads of dough wagered on the outcome.
Nobody bets money on pro wrestling any more, because everyone knows it’s fixed. And outside the small group of hardcore grappling fans that follow the ADCC Submission Wrestling Championships, authentic shoot wrestling has disappeared from the public arena.
While the TNA World Heavyweight Championship match between Samoa Joe and Kurt Angle owes a good deal to the recent boom in the popularity of MMA, it was in many ways a throwback to the earliest days of professional wrestling, where the emphasis was on technique rather than spectacle.
ADDING WATER TO WINE
As an MMA fan, my biggest problem with pro wrestling is the fact that so much of what goes on in the name of wrestling has nothing to do with the art itself. It’s the oldest sport in the world, appearing on vases from ancient Greece and mentioned in the Old Testament. But now so much water has been added to the wine that wrestling has been degraded to men in spandex pants hitting each other with folding chairs.
The obvious level of complicity is another stumbling block. The fights in a Tony Jaa or Sammo Hung movie may be choreographed with a fixed outcome, but they still look like a fight in which no one co-operates in arranging their own demise.
Pro wrestling lost my interest when I took my younger cousin to see a WWE show and every match followed the exact same formula: the heel starts out pasting the hero all over the ring, only for the good guy to come back from the brink to snatch victory from the maw of defeat. The matches never looked competitive, with the same handful of moves repeated over and over, punctuated only by each character’s antics.
My childhood love of watching wrestling on ITV still lurks within and I’ve been tempted to tune into wrestling from time to time, only to walk away disappointed by the sheer phoniness of it all. So I approached the Samoa Joe versus Kurt Angle match with a good deal of scepticism, ready to be disappointed.
NOT MEN IN TIGHTS
The first obvious different between this bout and every other wrestling match of the last 20 was the absence of spandex. Neither man was dressed in a gaudy outfit, with Joe sporting a pair of simple two-coloured trunks, along with wrestling shoes, knee pads and shin pads that looked straight out of Pancrase circa 1995.
Gone were Angle’s brightly coloured singlets, replaced by a pair of black board shorts of the style that has become ubiquitous in MMA. A change in wardrobe may seem trivial but, by dressing like a real fighter, Angle was making clear his intention that this was a match the viewer was supposed to take seriously.
The six-sided ring within a cage was an odd blend of the two environments in which MMA is contested, but the presence of the ropes confirmed the contest’s place within the wrestling paradigm.
Contrary to what you might expect, rope escapes were a feature in many early Japanese MMA promotions. In Pancrase, for example, a fighter caught in a submission hold could get a restart by snagging a rope, although they lost a point every time they did so, with five lost points ending the match.
This reflected the fact that mixed martial arts in Japan sprang directly from professional wrestling; if you want to find the closest cousin to the TNA match, look to the East, not to the UFC.
AS REAL AS IT GETS?
TNA did a nice job of laying the groundwork. There was the promo reel of Joe working out with UFC fighter Marcus Davis (interviewed on page 30), a ring announcer introducing the fighters just like in a boxing or MMA fight, and a referee who wasn’t a celebrity guest.
There were no props, no folding chairs and no outside interference during the match, all of which can break the illusion of pro wrestling being an authentic contest since, if a cornerman so much as sets foot inside the ring or cage during an MMA bout, the result is an instant disqualification for the fighter.
The problem with many pro wrestling moves is that they look staged – the submissions are never applied properly, obvious counters are ignored and there’s too much flying around the ring and playing for the crowd. This match cleared some, but not all of those hurdles.
Kurt Angle’s wrestling pedigree is well documented, but his background is in freestyle, not submission wrestling. However, as the fight started, it was Angle who was pulling off the better submission moves, not “The Samoan Submission Machine”. The former Olympian applies a side choke with authority and takes a textbook armbar from the mount.
All of a sudden, these guys look like they mean business. What fails to convince, however, are the leg kicks they trade on their feet; real fighters work to hide their pain when they take a hit, not to grimace and limp around.
WORKING SNUG
Betraying the facade of his “training” with Marcus Davis, Joe is the less convincing puncher of the pair, not putting his considerable weight behind his blows and instead punching, well, like a wrestler. The pro wrestling staple of punching at the forehead is a red flag to seasoned fighters – the forehead is more than hard enough to break a fist even with gloves on, never mind bare-knuckle.
Angle, however, doesn’t look like he’s aiming for the forehead; he looks like he’s throwing straight down the pike. His striking looks the sharper – he snaps out his jab with conviction and throws with bad intentions while working his ground and pound on top of Joe. Nice.
There are some sweet takedowns – a picture-perfect hiptoss from Joe and several fast single-legs from Angle, in place of all the gimmicky moves favoured by the wrestling fraternity. They tend to stay tight when they are on the floor, which makes the match look more competitive – nothing screams “work” louder than watching someone stay in a submission when they’ve got all the room in the world to slip out of it.
Angle’s foot lock is a prime example of this – he never has Joe secured as he wrenches on his foot, so all Joe has to do to counter is roll over, but he always writhes around in agony for a good while before doing so. Angle’s not really cranking his toeholds, either – submission master Erik Paulson’s advice for finishing the toehold is to “try to shove the victim’s big toe up their butt”.
When performed by someone possessed of sufficient strength, this can not only shred the knee joint but has been known to snap the bones in the calf in extreme cases. Similarly, Joe’s neck crank isn’t on – he’s pulling back, rather than to the side with a facebar or forwards for a can opener. The only time MMA fighters pull their opponent’s head straight back is to expose the neck to a choke.
HYBRID WRESTLING
The fight makes a strange hybrid of wrestling and MMA. Joe’s chops to the throat are pure theatre – a strike direct the trachea is illegal in MMA because it’s potentially fatal if you collapse the windpipe. There is some back and forth in the contest but, taken as a whole, it follows the wrestling formula, with the heel dominating before the hero comes back to turn the tables and clinch the win.
Some attacks are better known for their use in wrestling, like the powerbomb and Boston Crab. But Quinton Jackson powerbombed Ricardo Arona into oblivion in Pride, while the Boston Crab can be an effective submission move – just not one ever seen in MMA (probably because it’s nigh impossible to secure both of your opponents legs when they’re scrambling and covered in sweat).
Ultimately, for my money, this was a hugely entertaining match that was largely successful in walking the tightrope between spectacle and sport. Joe’s clothesline knockdown might be pure professional wrestling, but it dropped Angle hard and looked superb. Similarly, while I could see Joe helping to launch himself whenever Angle went for a suplex, it still looked cool to see a 280-pound guy get some quality air time.
I’m not sure how many MMA fans might be tempted to tune into wrestling if more matches were conducted in this vein, but it gets my vote. It was fast paced and there were no gimmicks – and it didn’t need any, as these guys worked their asses off.
I came away thoroughly satisfied, but the question TNA has to ask itself is: with MMA taking names and kicking ass on pay-per-view, can fake fights still compete with the real thing? On the most fundamental level, after a century of worked contests, does pro wrestling suddenly need to be taken seriously to survive?
THE WRESTLING PERSPECTIVE
by Michael Campbell
There’s a fundamental flaw when it comes to using terms like “shoot”, as Kurt Angle did in the build-up to this match on Impact!. In doing so you’re essentially undermining the entire nature of professional wrestling, because all matches are supposedly a “shoot” within their own context.
Imagine watching an action flick and, before the final scene, the lead hero (let’s say Bruce Campbell) proclaims that this one would be “real” and a “shoot” – not phoney, like all those scenes that came before. The suspension of disbelief goes clean out of the window. How can you buy into the supposed danger to Bruce when, even in his own make-believe world, he admits that it’s not real?
Billing a match as a shoot also leads to much harsher criticism from sceptics (some of them only deciding to be sceptical because they feel goaded by the claim) and goes completely over the heads of those who don’t know the difference. Not to mention that, historically, worked shoots can turn into colossal flops.
THE APPEAL OF BEING REAL
That said, I feel that martial artists, MMA fans and those who dismiss professional wrestling in general because it “isn’t real” tend to exhibit some closed-mindedness. What’s great about watching the UFC, from the perspective of a long-term wrestling fanatic, is that it’s authentic, genuine and a fight can end at any moment.
But, equally, what I then love about the so-called “soap opera” of wrestling is that it’s possible to work any story you want, and control the environment in a way that is most satisfying for the audience. I would regard it as “art” to MMA’s “sport”. And I believe that there’s room for both to co-exist and for each to learn from the other.
Somehow, on the fateful night of night of 13 April, the folks at TNA did exactly that, adding many little touches that were both special and unforeseen. The introductions were done properly, in-ring, heightening the significance of the occasion (which WWE replicated at Backlash). Frank Trigg was brought in to produce some absolutely unequalled depth in the commentary booth, while Marcus Davis was there to corner Joe.
Angle even jettisoned his familiar singlet for fighter-style shorts and went shoeless (which, in my estimation, was an unnecessary risk). Most importantly, though, everything was brought together in a fashion that highlighted the true essence of what this was all about: the TNA World Championship. Never has that strap felt as important as it did when the bell rang at the start of this contest.
OH, THE NOVELTY OF IT ALL
When it came down to the ancient ritual of man versus man, with all else in the background, these two guys had a wonderful, if at times bizarre tussle. They immediately replicated the general approach to genuine shoots, with both guys protecting their heads and circling each other, throwing tentative jabs and launching leg kicks.
This worried me somewhat, as I felt that if the entire bout were a clone of a UFC heavyweight match we’d be in trouble – especially if they went long. It’s one thing to throw stiff kicks at the start of a worked match; it’s another to attempt the same intent after 20 minutes. I needn’t have worried, though, as soon it became clear what these two were up to and it made for an absolutely enthralling wrestling contest.
The match could roughly be divided into two halves. The first was a slow-building succession of MMA moves, but structured into a worked pro wrestling contest. The shoot-style holds and submissions were treated as if they were wrestling spots, sprinkled throughout to manipulate the flow of the match.
Although this perhaps risked offending MMA purists (there were moments that would have ended a real fight, and even as a wrestling fan I could pick these out), it did ensure that the bout was suspenseful and flowed in the old-school vein. They stuck with tradition, as Kurt Angle (the heel) largely worked over the babyface. This is one aspect of sports entertainment that is a unique, but usually necessary formula.
In wrestling, we need the babyface to cheer for because we know it is not genuinely competitive, and thus we cannot support one combatant based on the legitimate success of their performance. Joe and Angle exploited this magnificently as, following the slow build, Joe’s hope spots were momentary glimpses of fast-paced, heated, feverishly exciting wrestling, in contrast to Angle’s less crowd-popping mat work.
EXCELLENTLY EXECUTED
In doing this they also harked back to the Bret Hart tradition, where the match was structured to slowly entice audiences into investing their emotions, with each and every spot cumulatively meaning something before they really started pulling the strings during the final moments.
Joe’s stiff lariat was stunning. His trademark combination of a powerbomb, followed by a Boston Crab into an STF was a trouser-staining moment of excitement. And the pinpoint reversal sequences, in which they traded Ankle Locks and Crossfaces, were stirring stuff.
Why did these moments stand out so much? Not just because they were spectacular spots, as they’re almost all regulars in Joe’s matches. No, they were so exciting because the body of the contest that preceded them was designed to make them feel important, and to ensure that Joe was the sympathetic figure by the conclusion.
However, it wasn’t perfect by any means. In the early going the crowd almost slipped from their grasp, and Joe’s long-awaited title win was somewhat overshadowed by the experimental scenario in which it took place. As evidenced by this article it’s the match, not the victory, we remember.
Still, it speaks volumes of their worth that, like Edge and The Undertaker at WrestleMania, Joe and Angle were able to overcome the blindingly obvious outcome of their encounter (given Joe’s needless retirement stipulation) and created a degree of doubt in their struggle. Their success in doing this simply cannot be understated, and they produced something far beyond a mere novelty match.
BRAVERY REWARDS
If there’s one thing that the predictable turbulent world of wrestling could do with in 2008, it’s some courage. Trying new things has long been a staple in this zany land and, more often than not, it’s to the benefit of the fans. Think Hulk Hogan turning heel, ECW showcasing the lucha and hardcore styles, WWE running with the anti-heroes of the Attitude Era and so on.
We wrestling fans have notoriously poor attention spans, so the business needs to continue to evolve in order to maintain our interest. The success of the UFC over the past couple of years – and the fact that it is watched by a large portion of the wrestling fanbase – indicates that perhaps there is much to take from it.
In a sense, this was indeed the best of both worlds. Joe versus Angle did not totally succeed in passing itself off as more “real” than any other wrestling match; anyone with even the most rudimentary knowledge of MMA would immediately have seen through the performance. But to do so would be rather fickle…
For the rest of this feature, check out issue 28 of FSM – available at WH Smith and all good retailers. (For US readers we are now carried at Borders and Barnes & Noble, so check for local availability or click here to subscribe.)
Back to Articles Menu |
 |
|
