5 Ups And 1 Down From WWE Cruiserweight Classic (Aug 10)

4. Mat Wrestling Rules

tajiri gran metalik
WWE.com

When you hear “cruiserweight wrestling,” the first thought that often pops into mind is high-flying action, with wrestlers leaping off the ropes and going through insane gymnastics moves all around the ring. And while a lot of cruiserweight wrestling involves that, it is far from the only thing about the style. (As the intro episode made clear, “cruiserweight” only applies to the weight class for wrestlers, not the actual style of wrestling.)

That’s why it was great to see both second-round matches Wednesday employ a lot of mat-based wrestling, trading pinfalls, reversing moves, fighting over armbars, countering submission holds, etc. All of that showed new fans that cruiserweight wrestling can involve more grounded stuff, just in case you were worried that it was nothing more than “flippy-floppy stuff.”

If this was your first episode watching the CWC, you not only picked a good one, you got one where you saw a variety of styles and realized that the little guys can bend opponents like pretzels too.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.