I recently saw the Mankind vs Undertaker Hell in a Cell match. A match that has it’s own wikipedia article: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mankind_vs._The_Undertaker
From a Biological POV How is Mick Foley still alive after being thrown two stories with just a table to break his fall? He suffered “a concussion, a dislocated jaw and shoulder, bruised ribs, internal bleeding, puncture wounds, and several teeth knocked out.” And this is all in one match.
How do these pros go through so much damage without dying and usually having long careers? Is the Human Body really capable of taking so much damage?
In: 331
First of all, Foley in general and that match in particular are not good examples of the amount of damage a typical wrestler takes. Foley was a showman – to a fault – and that means that he did some crazy stuff in excess of what the average performer does, and that was one of the most, if not THE most, craziest matches of his career.
Wrestling is fake in that the winner of the match is (generally) known before the match starts – it’s a performance. It’s fake in that the moves they do are supposed to LOOK real but not actually be incredibly damaging – people are getting slammed to the mat in controlled ways which are supposed to land them safely, the holds they do aren’t actually causing significant stress to the body, and those chest slaps are more for noise than they are for breaking ribs. But it’s real in that they *are* still experiencing a lot of force.
For the two-stories-through-the-table bump, first, Foley had to really sell that spot in the planning phase of the match – the people he was pitching to were skeptical at first. Seconldy, that table is ESSENTIAL to the bump (all the force that breaks the table slows you down before you hit the ground), and Foley still got really, really hurt from it. You’ll also notice that, like many wrestling things, Undertaker doesn’t throw him off so much as Foley jumps and Taker has his hands gently on him. Foley is controlling his jump so he can fall at the right rate and rotation to land on the table in the way that dissipates the most force and protects him the most.
And the most dangerous thing from that match wasn’t the part where Foley went through the table from the top, it was the part where he fell through the cage. That was unplanned and that meant the fall was uncontrolled and much more dangerous. Foley was chokeslammed into the cage and it broke, causing him to fall to the mat below. In addition, a chair that was on top of the cage fell through after him and hit him in the head. According to Foley, he did the move improperly and it saved his life – for the chokeslam, the recipient is supposed to leap off the ground to make the move look better, but was too tired to do the move properly, and didn’t really get his weight too much off the cage. Had he done so, he goes through the cage with more force and dies. Foley WAS supposed to fall through the cage, but not at that time or in that way, and the top of the cage was supposed to sag first so that the height was reduced. What actually happened looked significantly cooler but was MUCH more dangerous.
TLDR: Wrestlers generally don’t take that much damage, they plan the dangerous spots and take them in safe ways, and nobody wrestles like that match anymore. Mick Foley himself is alive because of a combination of personal durability, planning, and a healthy dose of luck.
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