3. Piledriver
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkS6ChB9rrA Is there a more famous banned move in WWE? In the 1980s, the piledriver was a fairly standard finishing move, used by Jerry Lawler, Harley Race, Paul Orndorff and a whole host of others. It would be banned by WWE in 2000, and also stands as an automatic disqualification in a number of other promotions. The reasons why are clear, as being dropped on your head like that can lead to serious neck injuries and even paralysis. Even so, on the biggest stages the biggest moments must happen, and the piledriver is something that should be reserved for such things. We haven't seen the classic version of it on WWE TV since CM Punk hit John Cena with it during their barnburner on RAW in February 2013, and the crowd reaction to it was huge. The shocked reaction of the commentators was equally impactful, adding extra gravitas to an already fantastic match. Again, I'm not clamouring for the piledriver to return on a weekly basis. Seeing the move come out at WrestleMania would make sense, as that is supposed to be the stage where the wrestlers pull out all of the stops.
John Bills
Contributor
Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.
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