Professional wrestling

Professional wrestling (often referred to as pro wrestling, or simply, wrestling) is a form of athletic theater^[1] that combines mock combat with drama, under the premise that the performers are competitive wrestlers. Although it entails elements of sports wrestling and martial arts, including genuine displays of athleticism and physicality before a live audience, professional wrestling is distinguished by its scripted outcomes and emphasis on entertainment and showmanship.^[2] The staged nature of matches is an open secret, with both wrestlers and spectators nonetheless maintaining the pretense that performances are bona fide competitions;^[3] this is likened to the suspension of disbelief employed when engaging with fiction.^[2]

Professional wrestlers perform as characters and usually maintain a "gimmick" consisting of a specific persona, stage name, 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 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 a performing art evolved from the common practice of match-fixing among American wrestlers in the 19th century, who 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 stuntwork to their performances to further enhance the spectacle. By at least the early 20th century, professional wrestling had diverged from the authentic 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 the independent circuit, to internationally broadcast events at major arenas. The largest and most influential promotions are in the United States, Mexico, Japan, and the United Kingdom, which have each developed distinct styles, traditions, and subgenres within professional wrestling.

Professional wrestling has developed its own culture and community, including 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.

Context

In the United States, authentic sports wrestling is generally practiced in an amateur context. No professional league for competitive wrestling exists^[4] due to a lack of popularity.^[5] 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 a more literal meaning in those places.^[6] 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 thusly:

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 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 a professional wrestling exhibition. All engagements of professional wrestling shall be referred to as exhibitions, and not as matches.
— 19 CRR-NY 213.2

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 a carny term for a shooting gallery gun whose sights were not deliberately misaligned.^[7]

History in the United States

From sport to performance art

Wrestling in America 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 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,^{[citation needed]} 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 the stamina for an hours-long fight. Audiences also preferred short matches. Worked matches also carried less risk of injury, which meant shorter recovery.^[8] Altogether, worked matches proved more profitable than shoots. By the end of the 19th century, nearly all professional wrestling matches were worked.^[9]

A major influence on professional wrestling was carnival culture. Wrestlers in the late 19th century worked in carnival shows. For 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 the art of staging rigged matches and fostered a mentality that spectators were marks to be duped.^[10] The term kayfabe comes from carny slang.^[11]

By the turn of the 20th century, most professional wrestling matches were "worked" and some journalists exposed the practice:^[9]

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 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 National Police Gazette. July 22, 1905^[12]

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.^[13]

Several reasons explain why professional wrestling became fake whereas boxing endured as 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 a victory for all the pain to which they subjected themselves.

If a shoot match was ever performed in public, it was often the result of a "double-cross", which was when a wrestler had agreed to throw a match but then fought to win. During his career, Thesz observed that some shoot matches were performed to settle business disputes between rival wrestling groups.^[14]

In the 1910s, promotional cartels for professional wrestling emerged in the East Coast (up to that point, professional wrestling's heartland was in the Midwest), and these cartels quashed what little authenticity professional wrestling still had. In addition to the old advantages of fixing matches mentioned above, fixing matches allowed the promoters to artificially turn their more charismatic wrestlers into champions, whom audiences preferred. Fixing matches also allowed promoters to make long-term plans. With shoot matches, a promoter usually had to wait to see who won the match before making further plans with either wrestler.^[15]

Before the cartels, professional wrestlers occasionally had to fight authentic (shoot) matches to preserve their credibility. As promoters gained control over more of the country's wrestlers, there were fewer independent wrestlers who could publicly challenge the promoters' wrestlers to shoot matches. If an independent wrestler made a public challenge, the cartel wrestler could use his contractual obligations to his promoter as an excuse to refuse the challenge. Some promoters used "policemen" to deter independent wrestlers from challenging their stars. These policemen were powerful wrestlers who lacked the charisma to become stars. The independent would be forced to face the policeman first, who would give him a vicious thrashing that would put fear in him and force him to spend a long time recovering.^[16]

Promoters also had to deal with "double-crosses". It happened at times that a promoter was forced to award a victorious double-crosser the title of champion to preserve the facade of sport. The promoters punished such wrestlers by blacklisting them. Blacklisting could be fatal for the wrestler's career as there were few independent venues where they would be able to find work.^[17] Double-crossers could also be sued for breach of contract, which is what happened to Dick Shikat in 1936 after he did not throw a match as agreed. In the trial, witnesses testified that most of the "big matches" and all of the championship bouts were fixed.^[18]

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 the commission.^[19] 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.^[20] 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.

Not the least interesting of all the minor phenomena produced by 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."
— Morris Markey. The New Yorker. April 18, 1931^[21]

In 1933, a wrestling promoter named Jack Pfefer started talking about the industry's inner workings to the New York Daily Mirror, resulting in a huge exposé. Unlike most promoters, Pfefer did not pretend that professional wrestling was real and passed on the planned results of the matches to the Daily Mirror just before they took place. The exposé neither surprised nor alienated most wrestling fans, though some promoters like Jack Curley were furious and tried to restore the facade of kayfabe as best they could.^[22]

Newspapers tended to shun professional wrestling. It was a form of theater that pretended to be real sport, which offended journalists whose business was telling the truth.^[23] Eventually promoters resorted to publishing their own magazines in order to get press coverage and communicate with fans.^[24] The first professional wrestling magazine 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 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.^[25]^[26]

In 1989, Vince McMahon testified before the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board that professional wrestling is not a real sport because its matches have predetermined outcomes. He did this to have the World Wrestling Federation (his promotion) exempted from sports licensing fees.^[27] Shortly thereafter, New Jersey deregulated professional wrestling.^[28]^[29] The WWF then rebranded itself as a "sports entertainment" company.

The style

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 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.^[30]

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 the 1930s and 1940s.^[31] 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 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.^[32]

Towards 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 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.^[33]

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 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 the audience by tearing his shirt off before each match.^[34]

The promoter cartels

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 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 was the "world champion". Before the cartels, there were multiple wrestlers in America 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 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 a match against Gus Sonnenberg in January 1929.^[35] 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.^[36] Curley reacted to this move by convincing the National Boxing Association to form the National Wrestling Association, which in turn crowned 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.^[37]^[38] If a member poached wrestlers from another member, or held matches in another member's territory, they risked being ejected from the NWA, at which point his territory became fair game for everyone.^[39] 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 the independent.^[40] By 1956, the NWA controlled 38 promotions within the United States, with more in Canada, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand.^[41] 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.^[42] The NWA settled with 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.^[43]

Paul Bowser's AWA joined the NWA in 1949. The AWA withdrew from the Alliance in 1957 and renamed itself the Atlantic Athletic Corporation (AAC).^[44] 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.^[45] Gagne's AWA operated out of Minnesota. Unlike the NWA, which only allowed faces to be champions,^{[citation needed]} Gagne occasionally allowed heels to win the AWA championship so that they could serve as foils for him.^[46]

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 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 America. 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.^[47]^[48] Before cable TV, a typical American household only received four national channels by antenna, and ten to twelve local channels via UHF broadcasting.^[49] 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 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 a central authority.^[50] 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.^[51] 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 the promotion's closing in 1991.^[52]

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 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.^[53]

Industry conventions

In professional wrestling, two factors decide 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 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

Kayfabe is the practice of pretending that professional wrestling 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 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 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 the industry was anything but a competitive sport.
— Lou Thesz, Hooker

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 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 realistic.^[54]

The demise of WCW in 2001 provided some evidence that kayfabe still mattered to 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.^[53]

Performance aspects

I watch championship wrestling from Florida with wrestling commentator Gordon Solie. Is this all "fake"? If so, they deserve an Oscar.
— S. R. Welborn of High Point, North Carolina, question posed to sports Q&A column written by Murray Olderman, 1975^[55]

Professional wrestling shows can be considered a form of theater in the round, with the ring, ringside area, and entryway comprising a stage. There is less of a fourth wall than in most theatric performances, similar to pantomime involving audience participation. The audience is recognized and acknowledged by the performers as spectators to the sporting event being portrayed, and are encouraged to interact as such. This leads to a high level of audience participation; in fact, their reactions can dictate how the performance unfolds.^[56] Often, individual matches will be part of a longer story line conflict between "babyfaces" (often shortened to just "faces") and "heels". "Faces" (the "good guys") are those whose actions are intended to encourage the audience to cheer, while "heels" (the "bad guys") act to draw the spectators' ire.^[57]

In pro wrestling matches, performers often execute a series of pre-planned moves and attacks, ranging from grappling and throws found in some traditional forms of wrestling, to more spectacular stunts, sometimes involving props and special effects. The attacks in these matches are designed to appear dramatic while reducing the risk of serious injury as much as possible. Overall, the performers aim to minimize the actual injurious impact of their moves while maximizing their entertainment value. Shows produced by the largest professional wrestling promotions like WWE are traditionally performed in indoor venues, flagship events in this profession like WrestleMania are sometimes staged at outdoor venues; these shows are generally video recorded for live or delayed broadcasting for an audience all over the world. Additionally filmed footage known as "segments" or "promos" are usually used to accompany the drama in these shows.^[58]

Prior experience in legitimate wrestling is not a requirement for aspiring professional wrestlers, but is seen as an advantageous background. Despite its scripted format, there have been quite a number of performers throughout the history of pro wrestling who have had prior experience in legitimate wrestling, before transitioning to its theatrical form. A popular performer, Kurt Angle, is the first Olympic gold medalist in professional wrestling history, having won his gold medal at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games in freestyle wrestling. Another prominent performer is Brock Lesnar,^[59] a former NCAA Wrestler who won the NCAA Division I National Championship in 2000.^[60]^[61]

Rules and other dramatic elements

Professional wrestlers nominally compete under rules promulgated by wrestling promotions. However, the rules are not legitimate standards for sporting activity, instead serving as a basis to advance plotlines, similar to the artificial constraints imposed in other fictional universes.^[62] The sociologist Thomas S. Henricks has argued the rules serve as a basis for a structuralist moral order, serving to advance plot lines involving charismatic heroes applying an instrumentally rationalist approach to social conflicts.^[63]

Professional wrestlers do not follow an industry-standard set of rules unlike most sporting events, which generally have a governing body to regulate competitions. While each promoter can set his own standards, promoters have long understood that fans enjoy professional wrestling more when all matches appear to follow a consistent set of rules. The rules described in this section represent common standards but may not precisely align with the ruleset of any specific promotion.

Structure of performances

Matches are staged between two or more sides ("corners"). Each corner may consist of one wrestler, or a team of two or more. Most team matches are nominally governed by tag team rules. Other matches present under the premise of a free-for-alls, with multiple combatants but no teams. In all variants, there can be only one winning team or wrestler.

Matches generally take place within a wrestling ring, an elevated square canvas mat with posts on each corner. A cloth apron hangs over the edges of the ring. Three horizontal ropes or cables surround the ring, suspended with turnbuckles which are connected to the posts. For safety, the ropes are padded at the turnbuckles and cushioned mats surround the floor outside the ring. Guardrails or a similar barrier enclose this area from the audience. Wrestlers are generally expected to stay within the confines of the ring, though matches sometimes end up moving outside the ring, and even in the audience.

The standard method of scoring is the "fall", which, is premised as being accomplished by:

Pinning the opponent's shoulders to the mat, typically for three seconds (though other times have been used)
Forcing the opponent to submit
Disqualification of the opponent
The opponent remaining outside the ring for too long (countout)
Knocking out or otherwise incapacitating the opponent

These are each explained in greater detail below. Pinfalls and submissions must occur within the ring unless stipulated otherwise.

Most wrestling matches last for a set number of falls, with the first side to achieve the majority number of pinfalls, submissions, or countouts being the kayfabe winner. Historically, the matches went to 3 falls ("best 2 out of 3") or 5 falls ("best 3 out of 5"). For modern wrestling, the genre convention is 1 fall. These matches have a time limit; if not enough falls are scored by the end of the time limit, the match is presented as draw. Modern matches are generally given a 10- to 30-minute time limit for standard matches; title matches can go for up to one hour. British wrestling matches held under Admiral-Lord Mountevans rules (and similar systems across Europe) consist of a series of rounds – typically six rounds each lasting three minutes or until a fall or submission is scored, with a thirty-second break between each round and can either be two-out-of-three falls, one fall to a finish (mostly for low-priority warmup matches) or the wrestler with the most falls wins at the end of the final round.^[64]

An alternative subgenre involves is a match set for a prescribed length of time, with a running tally of falls. The entrant with the most falls at the end of the time limit is declared the winner. This is usually for 20, 30 or 60 minutes, and is commonly called an Iron Man match. This type of match can be modified so that fewer types of falls are allowed.

In performances staged with multiple competitors, an elimination system may be used. Any wrestler who has a fall scored against them is forced out of the match, and the match continues until only one remains. It is much more common when more than two wrestlers are involved to simply go one fall, with the one scoring the fall, regardless of who they scored it against, being the winner. In championship matches, this means that, unlike one-on-one matches (where the champion can simply disqualify himself or get himself counted out to retain the title via the Champion's Advantage), the champion does not have to be pinned or involved in the decision to lose the championship. Heel champions often find advantages, not in Champion's Advantage, but in the use of weapons and outside interference, as these poly-sided matches tend to involve no holds barred rules.

Some wrestling performances are staged with unique winning conditions, often to allow a thing theoristic plot construction. An example is the ladder match.^[65]

In the basic ladder match, the premise is wrestlers or teams of wrestlers must climb a ladder to obtain a prize that is hoist above the ring. The key to winning this match is that the wrestler or team of wrestlers must try to incapacitate each other long enough for one wrestler to climb the ladder and secure that prize for their team. As a result, the ladder can be used as a weapon. The prizes include, but are not limited to, any given championship belt (the traditional prize), a document granting the winner the right to a future title shot, or any document that matters to the wrestlers involved in the match (such as one granting the winner a cash prize).Something that is also common in pro wrestling is the cage match which comes in many variety and is often used as the final battle in a heated rivalry. Another common specialty match is known as the battle royal. In a battle royal, all the wrestlers enter the ring to the point that there are 20–30 wrestlers in the ring at one time. When the match begins, the simple objective is to throw the opponent over the top rope and out of the ring with both feet on the floor to eliminate that opponent. The last wrestler standing is declared the winner. A variant on this type of match is the WWE's Royal Rumble where two wrestlers enter the ring to start the match and other wrestlers follow in 90 second intervals (previously 2 minutes) until 30–40 wrestlers have entered the ring. All other rules stay the same.

Almost every professional wrestling match features referee, who is the final arbitrator of the fictional rules, which may vary from promotion to promotion. In multi-man lucha libre matches, two referees are used, one inside the ring and one outside.

Due to the legitimate role that referees play in wrestling of serving as liaison between the bookers backstage and the wrestlers in the ring (the role of being a final arbitrator is merely kayfabe), the referee is present, even in matches that do not at first glance appear to require a referee (such as a ladder match, as it is no holds barred, and the criteria for victory could theoretically be assessed from afar). Although their actions are also frequently scripted for dramatic effect, referees are subject to certain general rules and requirements to maintain the theatrical appearance of unbiased authority. The most basic rule is that an action must be seen by a referee to be declared for a fall or disqualification. This allows for heel characters to gain a scripted advantage by distracting or disabling the referee to perform some ostensibly illegal manoeuvre on their opponent. Most referees are unnamed and essentially anonymous, though some wrestling promotions, most notably in the present All Elite Wrestling, have made officials known by their names (and there are some cases where fans have called their names during matches). Zdroj:https://en.wikipedia.org?pojem=Professional_wrestling
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Náučná literatúra
Podvody vo vede
Popularizácia vedy
Potravinárstvo
Prírodné vedy
Pseudoveda
Scientometria
Spoločenské vedy
Teórie
Teatrológia
Technické vedy
Technika
Terminológia
Umenie
Výskum

Veda
Veda a technika podľa štátu
Veda a technika podľa kontinentu
Veda a technika podľa roka
Veda v kozme
Vedci
Vedecká literatúra
Vedecké databázy
Vedecké experimenty
Vedecké konferencie
Vedecké metódy
Vedecké ocenenia
Vedecké organizácie
Vedecké parky
Vedeckí spisovatelia
Vzdelávanie
Záhady

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