eli5 wrestling champions

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Ok I’m not from usa, so I dont really underestand wrestling. As far as I know its a scripted sketch with real phisical skill necessary to perform the act. But I keep reading about old champions or the first xxx race champion etc. What do you mean champion? If those are actors, so to speak, there are no champion, there is a script to follow. Its like saying Arnold swarzneger was the first terminator to defeat the advanced model in terminator2, what
? Please eli5.

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40 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

“Professional” wrestling is *sports entertainment*. Just like the show *Whose Line Is It Anyway?*, sports entertainment is just what you imply: everything’s made up and the points don’t matter.

“Championship titles” are simply plot devices that hook the audience and sustain interest.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Professional wrestling is not a sport. It’s a drama where the winners and losers are decided ahead of time, based on what makes for the best story. There’s a person in charge of the production who decides who wins and who loses, and who should be a champion.

Think of it like watching a TV drama about a sports competition. The show has people win and lose, but while that’s part of the show’s writing, it’s still interesting to watch. You cheer for your favorite character and hope to see them do well.

And yes, being a champion does just mean that the people in charge of the wrestling promotion believe that person should win, but it also means that they think that person is a star who is popular and will get people excited to watch the show. It’s not the same thing as a legitimate athletic championship, but it’s like saying “This person was the first Captain in Star Trek” or “This person was the first black superhero.”

Anonymous 0 Comments

“Professional” wrestling is mostly scripted, it’s an acrobatic show with a lot of mostly fake “attitude” to give people something fun to watch. It’s like a semi scripted, semi-improvised performance art where the wrestlers and owners of the company come up with storylines to entertain the fans. A lot of them are former collegiate athletes who actually know how to wrestle at an olympic level. But that doesn’t get them any money, the entertainment business of jumping off of ropes every other night does.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Okay so I’m guessing this might be a follow on to the First Native American wrestling champion post on the front page.

To help get this, there are two types of wrestling that are prominent.
There’s the sport wrestling, [like the kind in the Olympics, schools, colleges and clubs](https://images.nbcolympics.com/sites/default/files/2021-03/wrestling-101-equipment.jpg?impolicy=rect_small_384_216). This is a martial art. These are not scripted. It’s an athletic competition.

Then there’s the [Professional Wrestling/ Sport Entertainment which](https://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/3c6f8ca71259ce9673c6821b3cda4a42aa656298/c=0-224-5177-3149/local/-/media/2017/05/02/USATODAY/USATODAY/636293254938396794-DARK-02282017rf-0072.jpg?width=660&height=373&fit=crop&format=pjpg&auto=webp) is the scripted (though still athletically impressive) staged matches.

While it’s still wrestling in a way, it’s akin to watching a movie about racing, opposed to just watching a race.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Modern professional wrestling evolved from basically a carnival exhibition. Talented amateur wrestlers would be hired to challenge guests to a match, and there would typically be a prize on the line. The promoter had to trust that they wrestler he hired would be able to beat any challenger, so no prizes would be won. It was entertaining for the onlookers, so promoters eventually saw the benefit of putting on matches in which both competitors were paid, so as to control the result.

From there, they knew people would pay admission fees to see the guy who won the tournament at their local fair take on the champion from another town. If both guys were hired, the matches they could put on could be choreographed to be as entertaining as possible; performing moves that shouldn’t be able to happen. The Championship belts were “won” (awarded to) the guys who reliably would draw the most money from ticket sales, or to someone evil and dastardly who could be chased down and eventually conquered by the valiant hero. The belt, more than anything else, signified to the audience who the “best” performers were and which story to pay close attention to.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Pro wrestling is considered a cross between a performance art and a sport. The championships still happening even though the outcome is predetermined is part of the sport aspect of it, if there is a sport then there should be something to compete for right?

But in the case of pro wrestling, the right to become champion is determined behind the scenes rather than on the spot. Of course you can’t just let whoever carry a belt. Wrestling champions are usually those who the promoters determine are the ones who are able to get the most reaction from the crowd whether positive (usually by “face” or good guy wrestlers) or negative (“heel” or bad guy wrestlers) and whom they observe is able to draw crowds to begin with. This starts through careful observation of a performer’s growth from show to show.

Most wrestlers start out the same way–losing matches at the bottom of a show’s card and so the people behind the scenes are able to see how well the guy performs at the short end of the stick in a match. Whether he’s able to tell his part of the story well. Then sometimes if they see the guy has potential they let him win matches from time to time and gradually give him more exposure. The chances of him being booked to win a title increase if he is able to develop his “gimmick” or in ring character in a way that the fans respond to. Then they are put to the test in title matches. The more good matches they put on for the crowd and the more that the crowds respond to them compared to whoever is the champion currently the more likely they are to become repeat champions, or keep their title for longer.

Even though it’s staged we need to consider the concept of a pro wrestling championship valid. At the end of the day a belt is still won or lost in front of a crowd and it’s really the only marker of achievement a wrestler will have in their career. It’s bragging rights and their egos and paychecks are on the line everytime a title is defended.

Anonymous 0 Comments

A friend of mine wrote two seasons of GLOW (the original one back in the 80s, which was fictionalized in the recent Netflix series). He said that the wrestlers were always very nice to him because they knew he was the one who decided who won and who lost.

Anonymous 0 Comments

“Professional” wrestling is *sports entertainment*. Just like the show *Whose Line Is It Anyway?*, sports entertainment is just what you imply: everything’s made up and the points don’t matter.

“Championship titles” are simply plot devices that hook the audience and sustain interest.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Professional wrestling is not a sport. It’s a drama where the winners and losers are decided ahead of time, based on what makes for the best story. There’s a person in charge of the production who decides who wins and who loses, and who should be a champion.

Think of it like watching a TV drama about a sports competition. The show has people win and lose, but while that’s part of the show’s writing, it’s still interesting to watch. You cheer for your favorite character and hope to see them do well.

And yes, being a champion does just mean that the people in charge of the wrestling promotion believe that person should win, but it also means that they think that person is a star who is popular and will get people excited to watch the show. It’s not the same thing as a legitimate athletic championship, but it’s like saying “This person was the first Captain in Star Trek” or “This person was the first black superhero.”

Anonymous 0 Comments

“Professional” wrestling is mostly scripted, it’s an acrobatic show with a lot of mostly fake “attitude” to give people something fun to watch. It’s like a semi scripted, semi-improvised performance art where the wrestlers and owners of the company come up with storylines to entertain the fans. A lot of them are former collegiate athletes who actually know how to wrestle at an olympic level. But that doesn’t get them any money, the entertainment business of jumping off of ropes every other night does.