For an art form widely considered to be dominant, or at least at dawn, professional struggle resembles many respects to a secret society. It is delivered with a jargon that is often not found in the everyday world, such as Babyface, Heel and Kayfabe; The struggle also includes many signals that are specific to it, in the same way that certain signs are unique in baseball. The most common, and the most unhappy, of these signals is the X, the sign that an arbitrator uses when a wrestler has undergone a legitimate injury.
But there is much more, especially the wrestlers applauding or striking their opponent in the back to report a certain movement to him, or the old practice of hanging the leg when a match was about to end. And then there are wrestlers who tighten each other. It may not seem unusual; In some cases, the struggle consists only for wrestlers to tighten each other to win matches, especially when they use a movement like a Bearhug.
However, the most common form of fighting compression occurs when a wrestler, or a referee, squeezes the wrist or leg of another wrestler. And this generally happens after the wrestlers have made a high -risk place such as a dive, a movement through a table or something between the two, the wrestlers using the pressure to report to the referee or their opponent that they are well. Compression has become the main technique for this, apparently out of desire to protect the company from fans, while verbal communication could reveal that the struggle was, the most shocking of all the shocking, predetermined. Over time, however, Kayfabe’s overall lesson and fans who understood the pressure led certain referees, such as the former WWE official, Jake Clemmons, to use it less, instead of communicating with the talent.
Other reasons why the wrestlers tighten each other
Of course, the Squeeze had other uses than the simple signal “everything is clear” to the referees or their opponent. Indeed, the Squeeze was also used as a warning, like the famous street fight of Wrestlemania 22 between Shawn Michaels and Vince McMahon. At the most famous moment of the match, when Michaels hit McMahon with an Elbow Drop of a scale, the referee pressed McMahon to prepare him for the spot. Even if it seems strange at first glance, it was less so here, since McMahon could not see Michaels because of the trash can above his head.
But perhaps the most famous example of compression in struggle occurred in a match that many consider one of the greatest in the history of the struggle; Bret Hart against “British Bulldog” Davey Boy Smith in Summerslam 1992. The match became famous for Smith’s victory in his hometown, he is well punctuated for half an hour, and due to the recent revelation according to which Hart a Mainly wanted the match to be grandiose by calling it to the end, after Smith admitted to him at the start of the match that he had forgotten all his places.
So where does compression come from? Just before the arrival, when Smith sat down sadly on an attempted Rollup of Hart to mark the 1-2-3 and the intercontinental championship. In order to create this place, Smith had to reverse an Irish whip from Hart, sending him to the strings. It was then that Hart hugged Smith’s wrist, reminding him of the overthrow. As such, the Hart-Smith match recalls how important compression is, whether it is used to ensure someone’s safety or to remind a wrestler what to do next.
