The Way I C It 10.29.07: Smooth Moves Volume 2

The Way U C Me

From Max Jordan:

I’m thinking Stone Cold Stunner. I mean you’re basically dropping a guy’s neck onto your shoulder. One wrong move and that’s it. Though I assume the RKO is slightly safer. Out of curiousity, will any mention be made of the Diamond Cutter?

Well Max, if you were right, I certainly would have mentioned the Diamond Cutter. However, I don’t know that the Stunner is banned (I am open to correction, of course). This idea has been filed for a future column…

From Matt Eli, who provides a great write-up, some fantasy booking, some opinion…someone get this guy a column! I’ve edited some of it, since his guess was not correct, but look for more of it when I actually do the Shooting Star Press.

Hey man,

Great column this week. I personally love it when writers go into detail about moves, and analyse their histories, effects, names and such. There was an old column on 411Mania called “The Finish Line,” written by Matt Nute. Those were actually the columns that got me onto the site in the first place, so it’s good to see someone take over and provide a look on specific moves.
As for next week’s column, I’m going to assume that you’re talking about the Shooting Star Press? It’s banned, and Paul London occasionally whips out a standing variant.
My personal belief is that the WWE should get off its high horse, and realise that moves like this don’t actually increase the chance of injuries (sorry, Jim Ross). The Shooting Star Press was fucked up by Billy Kidman and Brock Lesnar, but Kidman always performed a pretty shitty version, and Lesnar’s botch was just that…a botch. A one off mistake. He also probably gained a bit of size, and the match that had gone before between him and Angle had probably worn him out/messed with his head a bit. It was a freak happening. John Cena tore his pectoral off a hip toss; that doesn’t mean the move should be banned. Paul London should be allowed to do the London Calling as a finishing move. It would help him and Brian Kendrick move some merchandise as a tag team act, and become this generation’s versions of The Hardy Boyz. If Ashley Massaro returns to their side, there is no reason these guys could not be bigger than The Hardys. I love Matt Hardy, and have nothing against Jeff Hardy, but Paul London & Brian Kendrick are both better workers (although Matt Hardy is a great ring general these days), and I’m willing to bet they are better talkers, have more personality, and will do just as much crazy shit given half the chance. The London Calling can be Paul London’s answer to the Swanton Bomb, and Sliced Bread #2 can be Brian Kendrick’s answer to the Twist of Fate. Not only could Paul London & Brian Kendrick be as big as The Hardys (at least in ratio to today’s wrestling climate, which is on the downturn from the Attitude era), but they really could be bigger.

There is very, very little here with which I do not agree. Ashley could easily be the new Lita, albeit with 1/100th of the in-ring ability, and the parallels are almost there, except for one thing…Matt comes close to outweighing Londrick by himself. Although most readers of this site are fans of workrate and couldn’t care less how cut you are, the average fan has a hard time getting into two guys that look like they should be working for Ralph Lauren and not Vince McMahon. As for your opinion on banned moves, I have one minor quibble: although it’s a freak occurrence that caused Cena to get hurt, why increase the possibility by allowing people to bust out Tombstones and SSPs at will? The chance for an injury occuring are much higher. Look at it this way: by driving your car, you run the risk of getting killed in a crash. By speeding or driving recklessly, your chance is higher. One is legal, one is not.

I was surprised how many people guessed at the SSP. For example, here’s another one from Alex…

Two things popped in to my head when you told us to guess the next move you’ll review, based on the clue of someone uses a variant. THe only two moves I can think of (other than the blanket ban on piledriver) were the Pedigree and Shooting Star Press.
– Triple H uses a variant of his original pedigree, which if you remember was basically a double-underhook face down piledriver. Theres a clip floating around of Trips destroying HBK with it, before it became the more traditional Pedigree we know today. Trips of course, is the only one to use the Pedigree, although, one day I’m sure we’ll see him lock horns with CM Punk, leading punk to do the Pepsi Plunge.
– The other move is the Shooting Star Press. I haven’t seen one done in years in WWE, except recently, I’ve noticed Paul London doing a running SSP from the apron on to a standing opponent on the floor, thereby decreasing his chances of neck injury in that he only needs a 3/4 flip in the air instead of a 3/4 flip and then an 8 foot plunge.

That’s all I got.

Nice reasoning on the Pedigree, but alas not correct. The clip you mention is nasty, but there’s an even nastier one from his days as the blue-blooded Hunter Hearst Helmsley where he damn near kills a jobber. I’ll save the clip (if I can find it) for the actual Pedigree issue, which has more in it than you would think.

Interesting take on London’s standing SSP. Of course, the opponent is normally standing in the new version, which allows him to catch London.

JLAJRC gave me some much-appreciated additional background on the Tombstone:

I just got done reading your latest column and I like the newest thing you’re doing giving the history of a move.

Keep up the good work

Adam R Makes three guesses, none of them right, and one of them a joke. I hope.

Vertebraker or shooting star press. No I change my answer. Its a powerbomb, and Batista is the only superstar to use it.
Ha

Nice work, remembering the dropping-on-head fetish I have. But no. The Vertbreaker is likely to be in the Emerald Fusion column (FORESHADOWING! How do ya like that, JP?), and we’ve discussed the SSP. As for the power bomb…I just think it’s funny how, for a period in the late 90s, almost EVERYONE new who came in used a variation of it. Kinda like Generic Newbie Finisher number 11, the Overdrive/O-Zone/Playmaker.

But the WINNER!!! is…InnosourceATL!!!!!

Yeah, I’m an attention whore, but I doubt I’ll get in the column next week. I’m just going to take a wild guess and go with the Death Valley Driver (surprised they never tried to tie that to Taker) seeing as the FU is a bastardized version of it. Take it easy.

Well, the self-professed “Attention Whore”, InnosourceATL (awesome gimmick idea!), is in fact correct and will get the chance to write his impressions on the move! Despite stealing my idea of asking why Taker never used it. Then again, would YOU want to be dropped on your head from almost 7 feet up?

Unfortunately, he never replied to my email asking him for his comments, so that’s a shame. On with the show!

Smooth Moves volume 2 – The Death Valley Driver

More relevance!! Death Valley…Halloween…this is too much. Good thing there’s no Turkey Bomb or Santaplex. Yet…

The Death Valley Driver, often called the DVD, hasn’t been seen in WWE for several years. The opponent is lifted, fireman’s carry-style, onto your shoulders, then you elevate the opponent’s legs while falling to your side, the side where the opponent’s head is. The opponent then falls on his head. Yay!

The move is so popular with the IWC that it has even spawned a fairly popular, if highly clique-ish and very smarky and snobby message board, the Death Valley Driver Video Review. The origins of the move, however, may surprise you. To nobody’s surprise, it was created in Japan…by a woman. Just which woman seems to be a bone of contention among the joshi puro illuminati, but Aja Kong is a name often mentioned. Exactly who brought it to the US is not known, but it rose to prominence on the Indy scene and became popular in the mainstream when Louie Spicolli, who had been using the move, passed away. Like many a new move, the DVD then became the darling of young wrestlers everywhere. Perry Saturn started using it (before the moss-covered 3-handled family credenza, which is the best name for a move EVAR), as did several Japanese cruiserweight imports in WCW. Saturn brought it to the WWE, where it was also being used by the Godfather (as the Pimp Drop), and it was banned not long after at the same time as the Tombstone and the Piledriver.

Outside WWE, you can see Christopher Daniels using the DVD fairly often in TNA. In RoH, Jay Briscoe uses a miltary press into a DVD. And in CZW, Toby Klein, sometime partner of Necro Butcher, uses a spinning DVD. There are still some variations of the DVD that get used in WWE today, most notable of which is John Cena’s FU. Sean O’Haire, who had a cup of coffee with WWE a couple of years ago as Roddy Piper’s protégé, used a version where he fell to the leg side, not the head.

Video of the original DVD is surprisingly hard to find. YouTube only had low-quality indy clips and backyard feds. Nonetheless, I’m sure you’ve all seen one.

The most famous, and quite possibly nastiest, variation of the DVD is the one known as the Burning Hammer. Also invented by a Japanese woman, Kyoko Inoue, about 10 years ago, it was popularised with puro fans by the legendary Kenta Kobashi. He also innovated a wrist-clutch pumphandle version which is rarely seen or used. This move is so dangerous that you hardly ever see it in major promotions. The standard Burning Hammer is like a DVD, only with the victim face-up on your shoulders instead of face-down. This means he can’t see the mat coming and brace for impact, and he can’t tuck under as easily to take the impact more in the shoulders. It looks absolutely sick. Don’t believe me? Have a look:

The first usage by Kobashi. This next clip is just pure pain:

No trouble to see why the Burning Hammer never made it to WWE. Dan Maff (as seen in clip 2 above) used it, and Mark Briscoe uses a cut-throat variation where he holds the opponent’s arm around their own neck before lifting them. And I use it for every CAW I make. Once I unlock it.

The final version I want to look at is one developed by the incomparable Jun Akiyama. In case you’re thinking I have a hard-on for Japanese wrestling, you’d only be part wrong. Wrestlers in Japan do tend to get dropped on their heads more often, and most moves are invented there, so that’s why so much of these columns is based in Japan. Anyway, Akiyama has a great version of the DVD which he calls Sternness Dust Alpha. I’m only including this because I actually use this move myself as one of my finishers (The other one will be mentioned in a future column) when I wrestle, which is hardly ever now. Here it is:

As you can see, it’s more compacted than a standard DVD, due to the wrist-clutch elevation.

The most famous use of the DVD has to be the Tommy Dreamer tribute usage. When Spicoli died, Dreamer, who was a close friend, started using the Death Valley Driver, getting then-ECW commentator Joey Styles to refer to it as the Spicoli Driver. This sort of touching tribute has been recently seen with Rey, Chavo, and even Homicide using Eddie’s moves.

So that’s the Death Valley Driver in a nutshell. Next week, we look at a staple move in any cruiserweight’s repertoire, that has also been used by women, heavyweights and super heavyweights. Once again, guesses are welcome, and the winner’s thoughts go in the column! As long as they get them to me by Sunday afternoon…

No opinions from me this week, I missed most of the big shows due to this annoying thing called real life getting in the way, and my TiVo being eeeeeeeeeeevil. God that was a great gimmick. Wish I could find it on YouTube.

Til next week, Lansdellicious – Out.