Mid 20th Century
78-425: The Can-Am Express was a professional wrestling tag team comprising Doug Furnas and Dan Kroffat/Phil LaFon who wrestled in promotions such as All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW), Universal Wrestling Association (UWA) and World Wrestling Federation (WWF). They teamed up together for nine years from 1989 to 1999 and held success as tag team competitors. In AJPW, they were
156-435: A bona fide athletic contest or competition. Professional wrestling is not a combative sport. Wrestling constituting bona fide athletic contests and competitions, which may be professional or amateur combative sport, shall not be deemed professional wrestling under this Part. Professional wrestling as used in this Part shall not depend on whether the individual wrestlers are paid or have been paid for their performance in
234-415: A performing art evolved from the common practice of match-fixing among American wrestlers in the 19th century, who later sought to make matches shorter, more entertaining, and less physically taxing. As the public gradually realized and accepted that matches were predetermined, wrestlers responded by increasingly adding melodrama, gimmickry, and outlandish stunt work to their performances to further enhance
312-415: A professional wrestling exhibition. All engagements of professional wrestling shall be referred to as exhibitions, and not as matches. In the industry's slang, a fixed match is referred to as a worked match, derived from the slang word for manipulation, as in "working the crowd". A shoot match is a genuine contest where both wrestlers fight to win and are therefore "straight shooters", which comes from
390-571: A DQ. After this feud, they began a rivalry with the Legion of Doom , turning heel in the process. In the summer of 1997, Furnas and LaFon were in a car accident which kept them out of action for several months. They returned in the fall of 1997 where they teamed with the British Bulldog and Jim Neidhart as a part of Team Canada at Survivor Series 1997 against Team USA ( Vader , Goldust , Marc Mero , & Steve Blackman ). LaFon would be
468-413: A background in authentic wrestling no longer mattered. After this time, matches became more outlandish and gimmicky and any semblance professional wrestling had to catch wrestling faded. The personas of the wrestlers likewise grew more outlandish. Gorgeous George , who performed throughout the 1940s and 1950s, was the first wrestler whose entrance into the arena was accompanied by a theme song played over
546-532: A carny term for a shooting gallery gun whose sights were not deliberately misaligned. Wrestling in the United States blossomed in popularity after the Civil War , with catch wrestling eventually becoming the most popular style. At first, professional wrestlers were genuine competitive fighters, but they struggled to draw audiences because Americans did not find real wrestling to be very entertaining, so
624-519: A central authority. Nor could any of them stomach the idea of leaving the NWA themselves to compete directly with McMahon, for that would mean their territories would become fair game for the other NWA members. McMahon also had a creative flair for TV that his rivals lacked. For instance, the AWA's TV productions during the 1980s were amateurish, low-budget, and out-of-touch with contemporary culture, which lead to
702-585: A champion that Curley put forth: Dick Shikat . The National Wrestling Association shut down in 1980. In 1948, a number of promoters from across the country came together to form the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA). The NWA recognized one "world champion", voted on by its members, but allowed member promoters to crown their own local champions in their territories. If a member poached wrestlers from another member, or held matches in another member's territory, they risked being ejected from
780-500: A degree. Vince Russo, the boss of WCW in 2000, completely disregarded kayfabe by routinely discussing business matters and office politics in public, which alienated fans. I watch championship wrestling from Florida with wrestling commentator Gordon Solie . Is this all "fake"? If so, they deserve an Oscar . World Junior Heavyweight Championship (AJPW) The Pacific Wrestling Federation (PWF) World Junior Heavyweight Championship ( 世界ジュニアヘビー級王座 , Sekai Junia Hebī-kyū Ōza )
858-404: A distinct vernacular . It has achieved mainstream success and influence within popular culture , with many terms, tropes , and concepts being referenced in everyday language as well as in film , music , television , and video games . Likewise, numerous professional wrestlers have become national or international icons with recognition by the broader public. In the United States, wrestling
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#1732793690565936-410: A fee, a visitor could challenge the wrestler to a quick match. If the challenger defeated the champion in a short time frame, usually 15 minutes, he won a prize. To encourage challenges, the carnival operators staged rigged matches in which an accomplice posing as a visitor challenged the champion and won, giving the audience the impression that the champion was easy to beat. This practice taught wrestlers
1014-770: A fourth time holding a record for most time as champions. They would hold the titles for 304 days , becoming eleventh longest reigning champions before they eventually lost the titles to Tsuyoshi Kikuchi and Kenta Kobashi on May 25, 1992 becoming a dominant team of their era. They left Japan and went to work in Mexico . After losing the All Asia Tag Team Championship to Kikuchi and Kobashi, Furnas and Kroffat left AJPW and debuted in Universal Wrestling Association (UWA), where they worked as Can-Am Express (A common misconception
1092-608: A great series of matches, regarded as some of the best in the company's history. Not long after, Furnas and Kroffat left ECW. Dan Kroffat renamed himself " Phil LaFon ". Furnas and LaFon signed contracts with World Wrestling Federation (WWF) and made their pay-per-view (PPV) debut as faces at Survivor Series 1996 , participating for the first time in a WWF ring in a Survivor Series match where they teamed with The Godwinns ( Henry and Phineas ) against WWF Tag Team Champions Owen Hart and British Bulldog and New Rockers ( Marty Jannetty and Leif Cassidy ). Furnas and LaFon were
1170-405: A legitimate sport. Firstly, wrestling was more entertaining when it was faked, whereas fakery did not make boxing any more entertaining. Secondly, in a rigged boxing match, the designated loser must take a real beating for his "defeat" to be convincing, but wrestling holds can be faked convincingly without inflicting injury. This meant that boxers were less willing to "take dives"; they wanted to have
1248-799: A match against Gus Sonnenberg in January 1929. Bowser then broke away from the trust to form his own cartel, the American Wrestling Association (AWA), in September 1930, and he declared Sonnenberg to be the AWA champion. This AWA should not be confused with Wally Kadbo's AWA founded in 1960. Curley reacted to this move by convincing the National Boxing Association to form the National Wrestling Association , which in turn crowned
1326-424: A more literal meaning in those places. A notable example is India's Pro Wrestling League . In numerous American states, professional wrestling is legally defined as a non-sport. For instance, New York defines professional wrestling as: Professional wrestling means an activity in which participants struggle hand-in-hand primarily for the purpose of providing entertainment to spectators and which does not comprise
1404-440: A new city, attendance was high because there was a waiting fanbase cultivated in advance by the cable TV shows. The NWA's traditional anti-competitive tricks were no match for this. The NWA attempted to centralize and create their own national cable television shows to counter McMahon's rogue promotion, but it failed in part because the members of the NWA, ever protective of their territories, could not stomach submitting themselves to
1482-651: A part of the Team WWF/Team Titan stable. One of their first notable appearances was at ECW November To Remember 1997 where they assisted Rob Van Dam in a match against Tommy Dreamer . On December 5, 1997, they defeated the FBI for the ECW World Tag Team Championship . 24 hours later at Better Than Ever , they lost the titles to Chris Candido and Lance Storm in a three-way also involving Balls Mahoney and Axl Rotten . Following
1560-533: A record five-time All Asia Tag Team Champions . In ECW, they were one-time World Tag Team Champions and in UWA, they were two-time World Tag Team Champions . Doug Furnas and Dan Kroffat were long-time mainstays in All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW). Both men stood 5'11" tall. They teamed for the first time as heels on June 5, 1989 beating Footloose ( Samson Fuyuki and Toshiaki Kawada ) for
1638-503: A typical American household only received four national channels by antenna, and ten to twelve local channels via UHF broadcasting . But cable television could carry a much larger selection of channels and therefore had room for niche interests. The WWF started with a show called All-American Wrestling airing on the USA Network in September 1983. McMahon's TV shows made his wrestlers national celebrities, so when he held matches in
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#17327936905651716-586: A victory for all the pain to which they subjected themselves. In the 1910s, promotional cartels for professional wrestling emerged in the East Coast (outside its traditional heartland in the Midwest ). These promoters sought to make long-term plans with their wrestlers, and to ensure their more charismatic and crowd-pleasing wrestlers received championships, further entrenching the desire for worked matches. The primary rationale for shoot matches at this point
1794-668: Is a professional wrestling world title in Japanese promotion All Japan Pro Wrestling , contested exclusively among junior heavyweight (<100 kg (220 lb)) wrestlers. It was created on July 31, 1986, when Hiro Saito defeated Brad Armstrong in a tournament final. The original World Junior Heavyweight Championship belt had a similar design to the title it replaced, the NWA International Junior Heavyweight Championship , which had been around since 1982 and only replacing
1872-436: Is a form of athletic theater that combines mock combat with drama , with the premise that the performers are competitive wrestlers. Professional wrestling is distinguished by its scripted outcomes and emphasis on entertainment and showmanship . The staged nature of matches is an open secret , with both wrestlers and spectators nonetheless maintaining the pretense that performances are bona fide competitions, which
1950-410: Is a true sport. Wrestlers would at all times flatly deny allegations that they fixed their matches, and they often remained in-character in public even when not performing. When in public, wrestlers would sometimes say the word kayfabe to each other as a coded signal that there were fans present and they needed to be in character. Professional wrestlers in the past strongly believed that if they admitted
2028-427: Is generally practiced in an amateur context. No professional league for competitive wrestling exists due to a lack of popularity. For example, Real Pro Wrestling , an American professional freestyle wrestling league, dissolved in 2007 after just two seasons. In other countries, such as Iran and India , wrestling enjoys widespread popularity as a genuine sport, and the phrase "professional wrestling" therefore has
2106-470: Is likened to the suspension of disbelief employed when engaging with fiction . Professional wrestlers perform as characters and usually maintain a " gimmick " consisting of a specific persona , stage name , entrance theme , and other distinguishing traits. Matches are the primary vehicle for advancing storylines, which typically center on interpersonal conflicts, or feuds , between heroic " faces " and villainous " heels ". A wrestling ring , akin to
2184-517: Is that they worked as the " Can-Am Connection "). Shortly after debut, they defeated Los Cowboys / Los Effectivos ( Silver King and El Texano) for their first UWA World Tag Team Championship . They started a historic feud with Los Cowboys and defended the titles twice against them in July. Furnas and Kroffat retained their titles until they lost to Los Villanos ( Villano IV and Villano V ) on November 28 of that year. Furnas and Kroffat began feuding with
2262-610: The All Asia Tag Team Championship . They spent their early beginnings as a tag team and champions, feuding with Fuyuki and Kawada. After four months, they lost the titles back to Kawada and Fuyuki on October 20. Furnas and Kroffat regained the titles from Kawada and Fuyuki on March 2, 1990 winning the titles for a second time. They lost the titles a month later to the popular tag team of Kenta Kobashi and Tiger Mask II . They wrestled many makeshift tag teams and tried to regain their All Asia tag titles. They spent
2340-624: The New Jersey State Athletic Control Board that professional wrestling is not a real sport because its matches have predetermined outcomes. Shortly thereafter, New Jersey deregulated professional wrestling. The WWF then rebranded itself as a " sports entertainment " company. In the early years of the 20th century, the style of wrestling used in professional wrestling matches was catch wrestling . Promoters wanted their matches to look realistic and so preferred to recruit wrestlers with real grappling skills. In
2418-530: The World Junior Heavyweight Championship from Masanobu Fuchi which culminated in a feud between the two junior heavyweights . Kroffat reigned as champion for the summer of 1993 before eventually losing the title back to Fuchi. However, the next month, on September 9, the duo became a record-breaking 5-time All Asia Tag Team Champions after beating The Eagle and The Patriot for the titles. They continued their domination in
Can-Am Express - Misplaced Pages Continue
2496-557: The independent circuit , to internationally broadcast events at major arenas. The largest and most influential promotions are in the United States , Mexico , Japan , and northwest Europe (the United Kingdom , Germany/Austria and France ), which have each developed distinct styles, traditions, and subgenres within professional wrestling. Professional wrestling has developed its own culture and community , including
2574-431: The spectacle . By at least the early 20th century, professional wrestling had diverged from the competitive sport to become an artform and genre of sports entertainment . Professional wrestling is performed around the world through various " promotions ", which are roughly analogous to production companies or sports leagues . Promotions vary considerably in size, scope, and creative approach, ranging from local shows on
2652-584: The 1920s, a group of wrestlers and promoters known as the Gold Dust Trio introduced moves which have since become staples of the mock combat of professional wrestling, such as body slams, suplexes , punches, finishing moves, and out-of-ring count-outs. By the early 1930s, most wrestlers had adopted personas to generate public interest. These personas could broadly be characterized as either faces (likeable) or heels (villainous). Native Americans, cowboys, and English aristocrats were staple characters in
2730-400: The 1930s and 1940s. Before the age of television, some wrestlers played different personas depending on the region they were performing in. This eventually came to an end in the age of national television wrestling shows, which forced wrestlers to stick to one persona. Wrestlers also often used some sort of gimmick, such as a finishing move, eccentric mannerisms, or out-of-control behavior (in
2808-509: The 1990s, WCW became a credible rival to the WWF, but by end it suffered from a series of creative missteps that led to its failure and purchase by the WWF. One of its mistakes was that it diminished the glamor of its World Heavyweight Championship . Between January 2000 and March 2001, the title changed hands eighteen times, which sapped fan enthusiasm, particularly for the climactic pay-per-view matches. In professional wrestling, two factors decide
2886-653: The Atlantic Athletic Corporation (AAC). The AAC shut down in 1960. In 1958, Omaha promoter and NWA member Joe Dusek recognized Verne Gagne as the world champion without the approval of the NWA. Gagne asked for a match against the recognized NWA champion Pat O'Connor. The NWA refused to honor the request, so Gagne and Minneapolis promoter Wally Karbo established the American Wrestling Association in 1960. This AWA should not be confused with Paul Bowser's AWA, which ceased operations just two months prior. Gagne's AWA operated out of Minnesota . Unlike
2964-408: The NWA, at which point his territory became fair game for everyone. The NWA would blacklist wrestlers who worked for independent promoters or who publicly criticized an NWA promoter or who did not throw a match on command. If an independent promoter tried to establish himself in a certain area, the NWA would send their star performers to perform for the local NWA promoter to draw the customers away from
3042-488: The NWA, which only allowed faces to be champions, Gagne occasionally allowed heels to win the AWA championship so that they could serve as foils for him. In August 1983, the World Wrestling Federation (WWF), a promotion in the north-east , withdrew from the NWA. Vince K. McMahon then took over as its boss. No longer bound by the territorial pact of the NWA, McMahon began expanding his promotion into
3120-568: The Villanos but they did not get a title shot for the rest of the year. They eventually won the titles for a second time on March 7, 1993 by defeating Los Villanos. In the next month of April, their lengthy feud with Los Villanos ended after Los Villanos defeated them for a second time to win the titles. Furnas and Kroffat left UWA shortly after and returned to AJPW. Furnas and Kroffat returned to AJPW in May 1993. On May 21, Dan Kroffat surprisingly won
3198-401: The arena's loudspeakers, his being Pomp and Circumstance . He also wore a costume: a robe and hairnet, which he removed after getting in the ring. He also had a pre-match ritual where his "butler" would spray the ring with perfume. In the 1980s, Vince McMahon made entrance songs, costumes, and rituals standard for his star wrestlers. For instance, McMahon's top star Hulk Hogan would delight
Can-Am Express - Misplaced Pages Continue
3276-418: The art of staging rigged matches and fostered a mentality that spectators were marks to be duped. The term kayfabe comes from carny slang. By the turn of the 20th century, most professional wrestling matches were "worked" and some journalists exposed the practice: American wrestlers are notorious for the amount of faking they do. It is because of this fact that suspicion attaches to so many bouts that
3354-561: The audience by tearing his shirt off before each match. The first major promoter cartel emerged on the East Coast, although up to that point, wrestling's heartland had been in the Midwest. Notable members of this cartel included Jack Curley , Lou Daro, Paul Bowser and Tom and Tony Packs. The promoters colluded to solve a number of problems that hurt their profits. Firstly, they could force their wrestlers to perform for less money. As
3432-424: The cartel grew, there were fewer independent promoters where independent wrestlers could find work, and many were forced to sign a contract with the cartel to receive steady work. The contracts forbade them from performing at independent venues. A wrestler who refused to play by the cartel's rules was barred from performing at its venues. A second goal of the wrestling cartels was to establish an authority to decide who
3510-418: The case of heels). The matches could also be gimmicky sometimes, with wrestlers fighting in mud and piles of tomatoes and so forth. The most successful and enduring gimmick to emerge from the 1930s were tag-team matches. Promoters noticed that matches slowed down as the wrestlers in the ring tired, so they gave them partners to relieve them. It also gave heels another way to misbehave by double-teaming. Towards
3588-423: The character in shows must be considered fictional, wholly separate from the life of the performer. This is similar to other entertainers who perform with a persona that shares their own name. Some wrestlers also incorporate elements of their real-life personalities into their characters, even if they and their in-ring persona have different names. Kayfabe is the practice of pretending that professional wrestling
3666-512: The commission. The Commission did on very rare occasions hand out such authorizations, such as for a championship match between Jim Londos and Jim Browning in June 1934. This decree did not apply to amateur wrestling, which the commission had no authority over. Wrestling fans widely suspected that professional wrestling was fake, but they did not care as long as it entertained. In 1933, a wrestling promoter named Jack Pfefer started talking about
3744-540: The current fashion of wrestling is the universal discussion as to the honesty of the matches. And certainly the most interesting phrase of this discussion is the unanimous agreement: "Who cares if they're fixed or not—the show is good." Newspapers tended to shun professional wrestling, as journalists saw its theatrical pretense to being a legitimate sport as untruthful. Eventually promoters resorted to publishing their own magazines in order to get press coverage and communicate with fans. The first professional wrestling magazine
3822-405: The end of the 1930s, faced with declining revenues, promoters chose to focus on grooming charismatic wrestlers with no regard for their skill because it was charisma that drew the crowds, and wrestlers who were both skilled at grappling and charismatic were hard to come by. Since most of the public by this time knew and accepted that professional wrestling was fake, realism was no longer paramount and
3900-603: The facade of kayfabe as best as they could. In 1989, Vince McMahon testified before the New Jersey government that professional wrestling was not a true sport and therefore should be exempted from sports-related taxes. Many wrestlers and fans resented McMahon for this, but Lou Thesz accepted it as the smart move as it gave the industry more freedom to do as it pleased, and because by that point professional wrestling no longer attempted to appear real. The demise of WCW in 2001 provided some evidence that kayfabe still mattered to
3978-470: The first place. "Double-crosses", where a wrestler agreed to lose a match but nevertheless fought to win, remained a problem in the early cartel days. At times a promoter would even award a victorious double-crosser the title of champion to preserve the facade of sport. But promoters punished such wrestlers by blacklisting them, making it quite challenging to find work. Double-crossers could also be sued for breach of contract, such as Dick Shikat in 1936. In
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#17327936905654056-610: The game is not popular here. Nine out of ten bouts, it has been said, are pre-arranged affairs, and it would be no surprise if the ratio of fixed matches to honest ones was really so high. The wrestler Lou Thesz recalled that between 1915 and 1920, a series of exposés in the newspapers about the integrity of professional wrestling alienated a lot of fans, sending the industry "into a tailspin". But rather than perform more shoot matches, professional wrestlers instead committed themselves wholesale to fakery. Several reasons explain why professional wrestling became fake whereas boxing endured as
4134-460: The government. They pledged to stop allocating exclusive territories to its promoters, to stop blacklisting wrestlers who worked for outsider promoters, and to admit any promoter into the Alliance. The NWA would flout many of these promises, but its power was nonetheless weakened by the lawsuit. Paul Bowser's AWA joined the NWA in 1949. The AWA withdrew from the Alliance in 1957 and renamed itself
4212-526: The independent. By 1956, the NWA controlled 38 promotions within the United States, with more in Canada, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand. The NWA's monopolistic practices became so stifling that the independents appealed to the government for help. In October 1956 the US Attorney General's office filed an antitrust lawsuit against the NWA in an Iowa federal district court. The NWA settled with
4290-480: The industry was anything but a competitive sport. The first wrestling promoter to publicly admit to routinely fixing matches was Jack Pfefer . In 1933, he started talking about the industry's inner workings to the New York Daily Mirror , resulting in a huge exposé. The exposé neither surprised nor alienated most wrestling fans, although some promoters like Jack Curley were furious and tried to restore
4368-496: The industry's inner workings to the New York Daily Mirror , maintaining no pretense that wrestling was real and passing on planned results just before the matches took place. While fans were neither surprised nor alienated, traditionalists like Jack Curley were furious, and most promoters tried to maintain the facade of kayfabe as best they could. Not the least interesting of all the minor phenomena produced by
4446-498: The members of wrestling cartels as the champion drew big crowds wherever he performed, and this would occasionally lead to schisms. By 1925, this cartel had divided the country up into territories which were the exclusive domains of specific promoters. This system of territories endured until Vince McMahon drove the fragmented cartels out of the market in the 1980s. This cartel fractured in 1929 after one of its members, Paul Bowser , bribed Ed "Strangler" Lewis to lose his championship in
4524-437: The platform used in boxing , serves as the main stage ; additional scenes may be recorded for television in backstage areas of the venue, in a format similar to reality television . Performers generally integrate authentic wrestling techniques and fighting styles with choreography , stunts , improvisation , and dramatic conventions designed to maximize entertainment value and audience engagement. Professional wrestling as
4602-717: The promotion's closing in 1991. In the spring of 1984, the WWF purchased Georgia Championship Wrestling (GCW), which had been ailing for some time due to financial mismanagement and internal squabbles. In the deal, the WWF acquired the GCW's timeslot on TBS . McMahon agreed to keep showing Georgia wrestling matches in that timeslot, but he was unable to get his staff to Atlanta every Saturday to fulfill this obligation, so he sold GCW and its TBS timeslot to Jim Crockett Promotions (JCP). JCP started informally calling itself World Championship Wrestling (WCW). In 1988, Ted Turner bought JCP and formally renamed it World Championship Wrestling. During
4680-509: The rest of the year, feuding with tag team champions. On April 20, 1991, they defeated Dynamite Kid and Johnny Smith ending their short reign of just two weeks. As a result of this victory, Furnas and Kroffat became 3-time All Asia Tag Team Champions, a record held by former champions Samson Fuyuki and Toshiaki Kawada. As a result, there were only two teams during that time to hold the All Asia tag titles three times. On July 8, they would lose
4758-466: The second eliminated from Team Canada by Vader while Furnas was able to eliminate Mero before he was eliminated by Vader. Bulldog would be the sole survivor. After Survivor Series, Furnas and LaFon would make a few more appearances mostly on Shotgun Saturday Night with one match being against the then-unknown Hardy Boyz before being sent to ECW. In late 1997, Furnas and LaFon returned to Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW). Upon their return, they were
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#17327936905654836-440: The stamina for an hours-long fight. Audiences also preferred short matches. Worked matches also carried less risk of injury, which meant shorter recovery. Altogether, worked matches proved more profitable than shoots. By the end of the 19th century, nearly all professional wrestling matches were worked. A major influence on professional wrestling was carnival culture. Wrestlers in the late 19th century worked in carnival shows. For
4914-421: The survivors, last pinning tag champions. As 1997 began, they began a feud with Hart and Bulldog over the tag titles, due to having pinned the champions. They got a title shot at Final Four and won the match by disqualification after Owen hit LaFon with his Slammy as Bulldog had LaFon in the powerslam . Though Furnas and LaFon won the match they did not win the titles because a title cannot change hands by
4992-595: The tag team division while Kroffat won the World Junior Heavyweight Championship for a second time on July 12, 1994 becoming a double champion. On December 5, Kroffat and Furnas vacated the All Asia Tag Team Championship to focus on the World Tag Team Championship , but became the fifth longest reigning champions in history with a reign of 451 days. Kroffat also reigned as champion for over a year eventually losing
5070-426: The territories of his former NWA peers, now his rivals. By the end of the 1980s, the WWF would become the sole national wrestling promotion in the U.S. This was in part made possible by the rapid spread of cable television in the 1980s. The national broadcast networks generally regarded professional wrestling as too niche an interest, and had not broadcast any national wrestling shows since the 1950s. Before cable TV,
5148-781: The title loss, the team broke up in early 1998 when LaFon left ECW. Furnas continued to wrestle as a singles wrestler throughout 1998 before he too eventually left and retired. Lafon worked in Mexico, returned to All Japan Pro Wrestling and the independent circuit in Western Canada until retiring in 2014. Furnas died in February 2012 and his body was found on March 2, 2012 at 52 from a heart attack. Professional wrestling 1970s and 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s and 2020s Professional wrestling (often referred to as pro wrestling , or simply, wrestling )
5226-698: The title to Yoshinari Ogawa on September 10, 1995. Kroffat and Furnas debuted in hardcore wrestling promotion Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) in 1996. After losing to Rob Van Dam at Natural Born Killaz in August 1996, Furnas refused to show respect and suplexed RVD across the ring. Deciding that he wanted to teach Furnas about respect, RVD challenged him to a tag team match at When Worlds Collide II . Furnas brought in Kroffat, while Van Dam chose Sabu as his partner. Sabu and Rob Van Dam had been feuding all year, but worked very well together. The two teams had
5304-400: The titles to Johnny Ace and Kenta Kobashi. AJPW wanted Furnas and Kroffat to regain the All Asia tag titles, so Joel Deaton and Billy Black were used as champions and defeated Ace and Kobashi for the titles and eight days later, they were defeated by Furnas and Kroffat for the titles. As a result of this victory, this unlikely Canadian - American duo became All Asia Tag Team Champions for
5382-519: The trial, witnesses testified that most of the "big matches" and all of the championship bouts were fixed. By the 1930s, with the exception of the occasional double-cross or business dispute, shoot matches were essentially nonexistent. In April 1930, the New York State Athletic Commission decreed that all professional wrestling matches held in the state had to be advertised as exhibitions unless certified as contests by
5460-471: The truth, their audiences would desert them. Today's performers don't "protect" the industry like we did, but that's primarily because they've already exposed it by relying on silly or downright ludicrous characters and gimmicks to gain popularity with the fans. It was different in my day, when our product was presented as an authentic, competitive sport. We protected it because we believed it would collapse if we ever so much as implied publicly that it
5538-535: The way of proceedings: the "in-show" happenings, presented through the shows; and real-life happenings outside the work that have implications, such as performer contracts, legitimate injuries, etc. Because actual life events are often co-opted by writers for incorporation into storylines of performers, the lines between real life and fictional life are often blurred and become confused. Special discern must be taken with people who perform under their own name (such as Kurt Angle and his fictional persona ). The actions of
5616-408: The word "International" with "World". This belt was replaced with a new belt on August 27, 2017. On June 3, 2019, then-champion Atsushi Aoki died in a motorcycle accident and the belt was retired and given to Aoki's family. A new belt with a new design debuted on January 3, 2020. There have been a total of 40 recognized champions who have had a combined 64 official reigns and six vacancies . The title
5694-420: The wrestlers quietly began faking their matches so that they could give their audiences a satisfying spectacle. Fixing matches was also convenient for scheduling. A real ("shoot") match could sometimes last hours, whereas a fixed ("worked") match can be made short, which was convenient for wrestlers on tour who needed to keep appointments or share venues. It also suited wrestlers who were aging and therefore lacked
5772-425: Was Wrestling As You Like It , which printed its first issue in 1946. These magazines were faithful to kayfabe . Before the advent of television, professional wrestling's fanbase largely consisted of children, the elderly, blue-collar workers and minorities. When television arose in the 1940s, professional wrestling got national exposure on prime-time television and gained widespread popularity. Professional wrestling
5850-488: Was challenges from independent wrestlers. But a cartelized wrestler, if challenged, could credibly use his contractual obligations to his promoter as an excuse to refuse the challenge. Promotions would sometimes respond to challenges with "policemen": powerful wrestlers who lacked the charisma to become stars, but could defeat and often seriously injure any challenger in a shoot match. As the industry trend continued, there were fewer independent wrestlers to make such challenges in
5928-650: Was previously considered a niche interest, but the TV networks at the time were short on content and thus were willing to try some wrestling shows. In the 1960s, however, the networks moved on to more mainstream interests such as baseball, and professional wrestling was dropped. The core audience then shrunk back to a profile similar to that of the 1930s. In 1989, Vince McMahon was looking to exempt his promotion (the World Wrestling Federation ) from sports licensing fees. To achieve this, he testified before
6006-415: Was something other than what it appeared to be. I'm not sure now the fear was ever justified given the fact that the industry is still in existence today, but the point is no one questioned the need then. "Protecting the business" in the face of criticism and skepticism was the first and most important rule a pro wrestler learned. No matter how aggressive or informed the questioner, you never admitted
6084-417: Was the "world champion". Before the cartels, there were multiple wrestlers in the U.S. simultaneously calling themselves the "world champion", and this sapped public enthusiasm for professional wrestling. Likewise, the cartel could agree on a common set of match rules that the fans could keep track of. The issue over who got to be the champion and who controlled said champion was a major point of contention among
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