Professional wrestling may not be what it once was, but the creativity and the work that goes into the business is out of this world. From Japan to Australia, and the United States to Canada, professional wrestling is recognized around the world as a leader in sports entertainment.
Wrestling comprises five mammoth companies in the industry: World Wrestling Entertainment, All Elite Wrestling, New Japan Pro Wrestling, Impact, and Ring of Honor. There is distinct jargon used within the industry to explain each character that enters the ring. Each wrestler is known as a face or a heel. Faces are the “good guys” that the crowd in the area, stadium, or even high school gym, cheers for. Heels are the “bad guys” that are normally booed by the active audience.
Also, wrestlers have a certain style of attack. These styles could be highfliers, where the athletes are jumping and flipping off the ropes around the ring. Heavyweights are the biggest combatants of them all. They are the kind of wrestler that will slam his or her opponent down and use power to subdue and pin the opposing wrestler. Some wrestlers focus more on submission holds. These moves tend to force the opponent to tap out. These moves could includebut are not limited to a RKO, a step up enziguri, and a DDT.
Wrestlers are either main eventers, wrestlers highlighted towards the end of the show lineup, or on the mid-card, which occurs during the middle or beginning of the show each week. But sometimes even the main eventers will open the show to bring in viewers for pay-per-view events. For example, Randy Orton will either open up Raw for WWE or will close the show. He will do the same for the pay-per-views he appears in.
Championship belts are a huge draw to wrestling. Each company has at least one main event championship, one mid-card championship, and a tag team championship. For example, WWE has two top championships, the Universal Championship and the WWE Championship.
Another job of the professional wrestler is to do mic-work or cutting promos to build up the storyline. These promos feature the wrestler or a few others talking on the microphone, and making the storyline at hand richer. These storylines could be about a wrestler betraying another, one wrestler trying to be better than the other, or even a marriage-based story.
WWE, World Wrestling Entertainment, is the most popular company. Run by Vince McMahon and the McMahon family, WWE is arguably the most prestigious company. WWE has three different shows inside the organization: Raw, Smackdown, and NXT. All three shows air each and every week with Raw and NXT on the USA Network, while Smackdown is shown on FOX. Althoug, WWE isn’t arguably the best promotion that produces the best production quality entertainment, but the company is still the biggest in the world.
Some of WWE’s biggest talent has come from NJPW, like AJ Styles, or came up through the companies developmental system, like current Universal Champion Roman Reigns, or Seth Rollins. Both Rollins and Reigns, along with Dean Ambrose, known as Jon Moxley, debuted on WWE’s main roster as the faction, The Shield. The faction has now split, with Moxley now a part of AEW. The Shield is arguably the strongest group in WWE history. The ability all three of these men have is incredible from Reigns being a powerhouse, to Rollins having a mix of high flying moves and MMA-like moves, to Ambrose and Moxley’s character work.
WWE also features characters like “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt. “The Fiend” is Bray Wyatt’s evil alter-ego. WWE either hits or misses on specific characters like Wyatt’s. The promotion also creates amazing female wrestlers like Sasha Banks, who is the current Smackdown Women’s Champion, and appeared on the show “The Mandalorian.”
WWE also builds up or turns wrestlers into stars quickly. In 2020, in a matter of less than a month, Drew McIntyre won the Royal Rumble and set his sights on the WWE Championship. McIntyre defeated Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania, the Super Bowl of WWE, in April 2020. McIntyre quickly become the best character in WWE. WWE is the biggest wrestling promotion in the world, and looks to hold that position for years to come.
AEW, or All Elite Wrestling, has quickly become the second most popular wrestling show. This company is run by Tony Khan who is a part of the same family who owns the Jacksonville Jaguars. Cody Rhodes, who left WWE to create his own story, also holds an authority role in AEW. All Elite Wrestling takes a different approach to its show; the company focuses on a win-loss record that benefits certain wrestlers. AEW prioritizes having champions with longer reigns, while WWE has much shorter ones. For example, former AEW Champion Jon Moxley held the title for 277 days, while “The Fiend” in WWE held the title for just seven days. Many of the wrestlers on AEW’s roster were either never given a chance in the WWE, or they were given up on and let go.
Impact wrestling and Ring of Honor are two other wrestling promotions that have found some success in the business. Both companies have wrestlers who end up in WWE or AEW, and even bring in wrestlers who left said promotions. Impact and ROH both have the same concepts as WWE and AEW, with promos and different types of wrestlers. In fact, Impact had the most recent woman to win the main title in the company that is normally held my men in Tessa Blanchard.
New Japan Pro Wrestling, NJPW, is the biggest and most popular company outside of the US. NJPW has arguably the best wrestlers in the world in Kazuchika Okada and Kota Ibushi. NJPW has all your different types of wrestlers and even brings back some of the more traditional styles of wrestling. Some big wrestling names that have come from NJPW and are doing great things in the US are Finn Balor, Matt and Nick Jackson, and Shinsuke Nakamura. NJPW still has some of the best wrestlers in the world.
The art of wrestling and the many talents that go into being successful character are vast. From being able to cut promos like CM Punk’s Pipebomb, to being able to hit Moonsaults off the top rope like Will Ospreay, or even spearing people like Edge, the wrestling world has many different styles that can interest anyone.
MOOSE PRINTS 
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