10 Precise Moments Kayfabe Ended

Break the fourth wall down.

Buff Bagwell La Parka
WWE Network

Even now, in 2019, a year in which Orange Cassidy wrestles apathetically with his hands in his pockets, and Joey Ryan's penis is protected with the discipline of an All Japan Pro Wrestling 1990s super-finisher, the amorphous, fading concept of 'kayfabe' is staunchly protected within certain circles.

Kayfabe was never a means of preserving the work, because the business was exposed as a predetermined "sham" years before the invention of the Irish whip - a move that in itself reveals the artifice of the racket. Kayfabe was held in reverence because suspension of disbelief drove ticket sales. A wrestler not taking this sacred tenet seriously was akin to seeing a boom mic in the foreground of a feature film; an immersion-breaking distraction that asked too many questions of the process, revealing it as careless and unworthy of investment.

That was then: the now, of best, ******* bouts, draws on a celebration, not concealment, of the performance.

Mainstream wrestling nominally operates within a kayfabe universe, although the concept is used as a dramatic device - so much so that we are effectively through the looking glass...

10. A Tale Of Two Wrestling Matches

Buff Bagwell La Parka
WWE.com c/o PWI

When did you first discover that wrestling isn't on the level?

The telltale slap of a super-kicking thigh? The stamp on the mat that accentuates - but reveals the lack of true connection behind - a punch to the face? The sense of real pain grasped from a real combat sport that puts one in the eye of wrestling's lack of bruising?

For the spectators drawn to Comiskey Park on September 4, 1911 - and the rest of the world, to which the events reverberated - it was the sequel to Frank Gotch Vs. George Hackenschmidt: 'The Event of the Century'.

Gotch was the man who, under the tutelage of the diminutive but nail-tough Farmer Burns, brought technical submission prowess to the big-time heavyweight theatre of pro wrestling, which itself comprehensively out-drew boxing, the less "legitimate" sport. Hackenschmidt, the Russian Lion, was a superhuman of absurd strength and resolve.

A rematch of a legendary, arduous, two-hour 1908 encounter widely considered to be a shoot, the 20 minute duration and sudden finish betrayed the old slogs to such a revealing extent that, as the Chicago Tribune had it:

"Most of the spectators filed out of the place in orderly fashion, feeling something had been done to them, they knew not exactly what, but something."

Fix? Screwjob? A sense of "going easy?"

A convergence of chicanery that could not be ignored - the same chicanery that always existed, but never so obviously - all but ended wrestling's reign as America's most popular sport.

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Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!