Greatest Practitioners: Georg Hackenschmidt, Bruno Sammartino. Also Used By: Andre The Giant, Brock Lesnar, The Ultimate Warrior, Big Show, Big John Studd, Mark Henry (and every other big man in the history of wrestling...) The psychology behind the bearhug is deceptively simple. Take a great big set of powerful arms, wrap them around the waist of a smaller opponent and literally squeeze the air out of him until he passes out. It sounds a bit silly, but the bearhug is actually a very dangerous move if employed for real. Evolving from amateur wrestling, the bearhug has been usually been used as a finisher by large, powerful wrestlers. In photographs, it demonstrates the strength of a wrestler and provides an easy (and effective) photo opportunity. Used by a babyface, the bearhug demonstrates power and dominance. When used by a heel, it becomes a useful sympathy-inducing tool in David vs. Goliath matches (such as Brock Lesnar vs. Eddie Guerrero at WWE No Way Out 2004 or Sycho Sid vs. Shawn Michaels at the 1997 WWF Royal Rumble). By far the most effective bearhugger of all time was The Russian Lion Georg Hackenschmidt, a legitimate candidate for the strongest man of his era (early 20th century) and something of a physical marvel. Hackenschmidt was probably the first widely recognized World Champion of wrestling, although were talking legitimate catch wrestling contests here. Hackenschmidt was not a technical marvel by any stretch of the imagination, but once he locked in his signature bearhug, pretty much any bout would be brought to a swift and decisive end.
I am a professional author and lifelong comic books/pro wrestling fan. I also work as a journalist as well as writing comic books (I also draw), screenplays, stage plays, songs and prose fiction.
I don't generally read or reply to comments here on What Culture (too many trolls!), but if you follow my Twitter (@heyquicksilver), I'll talk to you all day long!
If you are interested in reading more of my stuff, you can find it on http://quicksilverstories.weebly.com/ (my personal site, which has other wrestling/comics/pop culture stuff on it).
I also write for FLiCK http://www.flickonline.co.uk/flicktion, which is the best place to read my fiction work.
Oh yeah - I'm about to become a Dad for the first time, so if my stuff seems more sentimental than usual - blame it on that!
Finally, I sincerely appreciate every single read I get. So if you're reading this, thank you, you've made me feel like Shakespeare for a day! (see what I mean?)
Latcho Drom,
- CQ
