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Happy 60th Birthday, Bret Hart


tiger_rick

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It's been called that for years. Someone told me it was supposed to be the Brooklyn Brawler's "finisher", but the only time I can ever imagine that being true was when he was feuding with the Red Rooster back when he was debuting, before he settled into the role of jobber.

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Many probably don't do it, and I haven't checked whether Bret did, but isn't the idea of an inverted atomic drop to hold your opponent's thighs, thereby slightly pulling their legs forward/upwards and impeding their ability to flat footedly break their fall?

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I've never encountered Manhattan Drop as a Japanese name, though that would make some sense, I just know the name because it was used on the video games. Never heard it called that in "real life". As the first two Smackdown games were built off the back of Yukes' Japanese games, they tended to have a few Japanese moves and so on in there.

I'm not sure if the Inverted Atomic Drop is, in kayfabe terms, actually supposed to target the meat and two veg anyway. The Atomic Drop is aimed at the tailbone, and I kind of assumed the Inverted variation is intended to do the same, with the potential added benefit of being an "inadvertent" low blow.

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They sell their bollocks rather than their back on the Inverted Atomic Drop (yeah, Smackdown games tend to be my go-to for a lot of move names), and if they're not able to hit their nuts on that move because of the landing flat-footed then they're not able to hit their tailbone. The idea of pulling their legs so they can't land flat-footed makes some sense but I'm not sure if I've ever seen it in execution. I'm guessing part of this would probably be that they don't actually want to hurt their opponent and that people are willing and able to suspend disbelief and let it slide so long as the selling is convincing enough.

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1 hour ago, BomberPat said:

I've never encountered Manhattan Drop as a Japanese name, though that would make some sense, I just know the name because it was used on the video games. Never heard it called that in "real life". As the first two Smackdown games were built off the back of Yukes' Japanese games, they tended to have a few Japanese moves and so on in there.

I have seen it written in Japanese as the "Manhattan Drop" in Giant Gram 2000 - it's part of the Chono analogue's move-set.

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I blame video games for a lot of ills in wrestling these days, to be honest!

A lot of move names seem to stem from late '90s/early '00s games - did the WWF ever actually call Big Show's chokeslam the "Showstopper"?

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Probably not, but it's a cheerful way to differentiate the alternative animation. Better than Stone Cold Stunner 2.

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True, part of me misses some of the inventive names given to moves - usually around the time I'm watching the animation for "Suplex 9" to see if it's the move I'm actually looking for.

Though the video game talk has reminded me, vaguely back on topic, of how in WCW Backstage Assault, Bret Hart's finisher was the Russian Leg Sweep.

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I think my favourite wrestling move name ever is the 'Sack Of Shit', which is what Scott Hall used to call that fall away slam thingy he did.

Obviously they couldn't call it that on commentary but I wish they could. Especially when Vince was the play-by-play guy in the early-mid 90s. 

I think it was even called the 'SOS' on one of the Smackdown games as well. But I didn't know why at the time. 

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1 hour ago, air_raid said:

"Moveset" is another phrase we have to blame games for.

I only really use it with regard to video games nowadays. In wrestling training, we did use it as a technical term, because it's a part of wrestling psychology: wrestlers have recognisable moves that they do regularly, but also there are certain holds that a wrestler of a certain character/gimmick would or wouldn't do, unless there are extenuating circumstances regarding the storyline, angle or match.

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