Hitting Below The Beltway 11.18.07 The Big Finish

It should look like it hurts

This is pretty obvious, but for a finishing move to be really effective it should look like it would actually finish someone off. It has to look like it hurts. There are too many finishing moves out there that don’t look any more painful that the rest of a guy’s repertoire. That being said, some of the biggest stars of all time have managed to get away with having finishers that didn’t look all that devastating. The People’s Elbow and Hulk Hogan’s leg drop got over because of the massive charisma of the men delivering them.

Best: There are plenty of absolutely devastating looking finishers out there, particularly in the indies. The most obvious examples of vicious finishers are Petey Williams’ Canadian Destroyer and Homicide’s Cop Killa (aka Shane Helms’ Vertebreaker). With both moves the opponent is slammed directly on their head and neck. The Cop Killa and the Canadian Destroyer look like no one would be able to kick out of them. Both moves come with a fair amount of risk, which is an unfortunate side effect of a lot of vicious looking moves. Chris Jericho’s Liontamer from WCW looked extremely painful. It was totally believable that it would make a bad ass prowrestler tap out.

Honorable Mentions: Kenta Kobashi, Burning Hammer; Jay Briscoe, Jay Driller; The Undertaker, Tombstone Piledriver

Worst: The WWE has too many guys who have weak looking finishers and don’t have the charisma to get them over. The limits WWE puts on it’s wrestlers are frustrating, because we’re missing out on a lot of the cool stuff WWE’s wrestlers are capable of doing. Two of the best examples of weak finishers come from guys who were recently released. Scotty Too Hotty’s Worm and Chris Masters’ Masterlock both looked like they wouldn’t be able to keep a 5 year old down. For all its ridiculous build up, the Worm wound up with nothing more than a mediocre looking chop; Ric Flair and Roderick Strong throw 30 of them every match and they all look better than the Worm. While, the Masterlock looks like it would be hard to get out of, a full nelson isn’t a painful move. It can be used to restrain an opponent, but it doesn’t hurt.

Dishonorable Mentions: The Miz, Reality Check

The person performing it needs to be over

As I mentioned in the last section, a big part of a finishing move being effective is that the wrestler delivering it has to be over with the crowd. The crowds desire to actually see the wrestler win is a big part in getting a finisher over.

Best: As mentioned before, the Rock Bottom and the Hogan leg drop got over as finishers not because they were good in their own right, but because of how popular the guys delivering them were. The Stone Cold Stunner looks fairly painful, but it gets a monster reaction because of Stone Cold himself. Guys all over the indies perform some variety of the stunner, but they get tepid reactions for it, because they don’t have connection with the crowd that Austin does.

Honorable Mention: Rey Mysterio, 619/Dropping the Dime

Worst: So many guys in the indies don’t get nearly the mileage they should out of their finishing moves. For example, Matt Cross’ Crossfire, a shooting star leg drop, is very cool and when landed right looks like it would hurt a lot. Unfortunately, ROH fans don’t really care about Matt Cross so it doesn’t get nearly the reaction that Austin Aries’ 450 splash does, even though they’re comparable moves. Plenty of X-Division guys have bad ass finishers, but no one cares about the move because they don’t care about the guy performing it.

Dishonrable Mention: Havok/Johnny Devine, I assume he has a finisher, but who cares?

The move needs to be protected

For the fans to buy a move as being a legit finisher it needs to be protected. A really good finisher almost always puts the opponent down for the count. It should be shocking when someone actually manages to kick out of the move. Too often you’ll see matches where guys hit finsher after finsher only to see both guys kick out multiple times. One of the better examples of avoiding this problem was in the John Cena/Umaga feud. Cena didn’t just keep taking the Samoan Spike and kicking out; he outsmarted Umaga and avoided his big moves. That way Cena looked strong and the Samoan Spike still looked deadly.

Best: How many times have you ever seen someone kick out of Hulk Hogan’s leg drop in the last twenty years? You can probably count the number on one hand. That’s a big part of the reason such a seemingly weak move is seen as unbeatable. It’s also extremely rare to see someone kick out of the Stunner. The only time you ever saw anyone kick out of the Stunner was in Stone Cold’s biggest matches against the Rock or Triple H. Ring of Honor did a great job of making sure the Cop Killa was viewed as a no ifs ands or buts finisher. In Homicide’s four and ½ years in ROH the move was kicked out of once. Being the only person to kick out of the Cop Killa went a long way in making BJ Whitmer look like one of the guys around.

Honorable Mention: The Undertaker, Tombstone Piledriver; Triple H, Pedigree

Worst: I’m a big fan of Nigel McGuinness, but he’s one of the worst offenders when it comes watering down his finisher. He has two nasty looking finishers in the Tower of London and the Rebound Lariat. If used right, both moves are very credible finishers. Unfortunately, both moves get kicked out of in just about every match Nigel wrestles. The Tower of London is supposed to be Nigel’s finisher, but it never keeps anyone down. He wins most of his matches with the lariat, but it takes 10 for him to actually get a three count. If it takes 5 lariats for him to beat an ROH nobody like TJ Perkins, how many will it take for him to finally beat Bryan Danielson?

The DDT used to one of the most feared moves in wrestling for Jake “The Snake” Roberts, but today its nothing but a transition move. Back in the day, whenever Roberts hit the DDT that was the end of the match. Today the DDT is severely overused and almost never gets a pinfall.

Dishonorable Mention: Alex Shelley, Shellshock; Christopher Daniels, Angel’s Wings

The move should be realistic

This is something that should apply to all wrestling moves, not just finishers. While everyone knows that wrestling is fake, that doesn’t mean that guys should just break out what ever ridiculous move they can think of. Part of what makes wrestling work is keeping up the illusion of realism. When guys do moves that are clearly impossible it breaks that illusion.

Best: There has been a wave recently of guys taking their finishers from MMA in order to make themselves seem like legit fighters. Bryan Danielson’s elbows to the head look nasty and are very realistic. The Undertaker using the triangle choke adds a new wrinkle to his arsenal and is a believable way for him to beat a guy like the Great Khali. Rocky Romero’s kicks to the head are sick and while they may not be as flashy as some indy finishers, they look deadly. Every time I see him take someone out with one of those kicks it reminds me of Rashad Evans knocking Sean Salmon unconscious on UFC Fight Night.

Honorable Mention: Kurt Angle, Ankle Lock

Worst: This where moves like the Canadian Destroyer really aren’t up to par. I think the Canadian Destroyer is an incredibly cool move, but the more I see it, the more preposterous I think it is. There is clearly no way that move is possible unless the opposing wrestler assists in the move. The move looks devastating and requires incredible athleticism, it’s totally unrealistic. This is a pretty common problem with high flying wrestlers.

Dishonorable Mention: Amazing Red, Code Red; Matt Sydal/Kaz, Cyclorama/Flux Capacitor

The move should be versatile

This category is a bit more of a luxury that the others. Hulk Hogan hit the leg drop the exact same way every time and that worked out fine for him. Still, having a move that can be done different ways can add excitement and unpredictability to a match. It’s also valuable if the move can be used against any opponent, not just those of comparable size.

Best: Two of my favorite finishing moves are Shawn Michaels’ Sweet Chin Music and the Diamond Cutter/RKO. One of the best things about these moves is that they can be done with a lot of build up or absolutely out of nowhere. HBK can go through his standard flying forearm/nip up/clothesline/body slam/flying elbow drop/tune up the band build to the superkick or he can end the match in the blink of an eye with one that nobody saw coming. Randy Orton has same luxury, being able to stalk his opponent, building the tension to see if his opponent can avoid certain doom, or catch his opponent and the audience completely unaware with a sudden RKO. AJ Styles also does a great job of keeping the Styles Clash fresh by continually coming up with new setups for it.

Honorable Mention: Nigel McGuinness and his various lariats

Worst: As I said this category is more of a luxury than a necessity. Still, there are some cases where wrestlers are hurt because of it. Some smaller wrestlers simply cannot use their finishers against bigger wrestlers. The Go To Sleep is versatile in that CM Punk could build it up or do it suddenly, but there is no way he is going to be able to use the Go To Sleep against a guy like Big Daddy V. That could be used to create an interesting story where Punk has to find a new way to beat him, such as breaking out the Anaconda Vice again, but it’s still limiting.

Similarly, Homicide was limited in his title defense against Takeshi Morishima. No one was buying that a lariat from a tiny guy like Homicide was going to put Morishima down, and there’s no way he would be able lift Morishima up for the Cop Killa, at least not without killing him.

Consistency

A wrestler should be able to hit their finishing move properly every time they go for it. A good finishing move is wasted if the wrestler can’t hit it accurately. This factor is contingent on both the skill of the wrestler and the difficulty of the move.

Best: Simple moves are the ones that most consistently look good. Batista’s powerbomb looks powerful just about every time. Rob Van Dam’s Five Star Frog Splash was always beautiful and consistently got good impact. Most submission finishers consistently look good, as they’re simply a matter of applying the hold rather than performing a move.

Honorable Mention: Triple H, Pedigree; Samoa Joe, Musclebuster and Choke

Worst: I hate to rag on Punk again, as I am a fan of his, but the Go To Sleep is a pretty inconsistent move. When done right, which is as much reliant on his opponent as it is on Punk, the move looks vicious. However, there are too many times when the move blatantly doesn’t connect and Punk gets a win after kneeing his opponent in the forearms.

More complicated high risk moves are also fairly inconsistent, because of the difficulty involved in performing them. While I don’t like it, the WWE had good intentions when they banned the Shooting Star Press and the 450 splash. So many wrestlers have been injured attempting these high risk moves. Brock Lesnar, Mark Briscoe and Chavo Guerrero are all lucky to still be wrestling after being on the wrong side of a botched Shooting Star Press.

Dishonorable Mention: Jack Evans, 630 Splash

Final Analysis: There are a lot of factors which make up a good finishing move, but it seems like the most important is the wrestler himself. If the wrestler performing the move isn’t over, then the move isn’t going to be over either. Looking painful and realistic help a finisher a lot, but not as much being performed by person that fans actually care about.

So after scientifically and and smarkily analyzing this topic to death it’s time for me to have a little fun. In picking my personal favorites, I would have to go with the Cop Killa/Vertebreaker, the Sharpshooter and the Shooting Star Press. These are all largely due to the fact that I’m a fan of the people who perform them: Homicide, Bret Hart and Matt Sydal. The moves are all very well suited to the people who use them. The Cop Killa is named perfectly for Homicide’s thug character and fits his willingness to do whatever it takes to win. The Sharpshooter fits with the Hitman’s gimmick and with his persona of being the excellence of execution. The Shooting Star Press has always fit nicely for high fliers like Sydal and the young Billy Kidman, showing off their incredible athleticism.

My pick for the all-time worst finisher has to Mark Jindrak’s Jindrak Smack. To refresh your memory, in 2004, while serving as a member of Kurt Angle’s stable with Luther Reigns, Jindrak discovered that he had a vicious left hook he could knock people out with. Luther Reigns, who wasn’t all that bad, was then forced to job to one the lamest finishers of all time. The one thing the move had going for it was that it was fairly realistic. If you watch boxing or UFC you’ll see plenty of guys go down from a nasty punch to the jaw. Unfortunately, the move was just too plain to get over in the spectacular world of pro wrestling. Guys throw punches all the time in pro wrestling, and up until Jindrak started using it as a finisher almost no one got pinned from a straight left hook. Jindrak would land 15 punches in a match with little effect, then all of a sudden one which looked the same as all the others was suddenly deadly. Maybe the Rock or Stone Cold or Hogan could have gotten such a crappy move over, but Mark Jindrak? No matter how much WCW or WWE tried to push him, no one ever really cared about Jindrak. Even Michael Cole’s constant reminders that he had the highest vertical leap in WWE history could not bring me to care about him. To his credit, before switching to the left hook, Jindrak did have a sweet finisher called the Mark of Excellence, which was a back suplex transitioned into a Rock Bottom. Someone needs to bring that move back. Maybe Jindrak’s old WCW partner Chuck Palumbo could pick it up! Oh right, no one gives a shit about Palumbo either.

And the Garvin Stomp sucked. I can’t believe Randy Orton stole it as a transition move.