9 Wrestling Matches That Turned Into Real Life Shoots

6. Andre The Giant Refuses To Work Akira Maeda

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSE91FHzQnc Akira Maeda is universally agreed to be one of the stiffest and nastiest pro wrestlers in the history of the business. With a penchant for taking out his real life frustrations on opponents in the ring, the Japanese shooter, trained by the legendary Karl Gotch, would gain a reputation for being difficult to work with. Of course, there€™s difficult, and then there€™s difficult. When faced with a drunk giant who refused to work him, Maeda would soon find out what difficult really was. One version of the story behind this May 1986 encounter is that neither man wanted to do the job for the other. Another version is that booker Antonio Inoki €“ who Maeda was feuding with in real life, having refused to work with the boss in a guaranteed money-making angle €“ told Andre to teach the upstart a lesson. With a whole load of heat coming with him when he rejoined New Japan Pro Wrestling, Maeda was about due for a lesson. This wasn€™t it, unfortunately €“ Andre seemed legitimately too drunk to move, which for a man of his legendary capacity was some feat. He no sold several attempts by Maeda to get the action rolling, sweating profusely after only minutes. Maeda began to shoot on Andre, his kicks becoming more forceful. He took the giant down, only for Andre to simply tell him, €œpin me.€ By this time, Inoki himself had come to the ring, but was unable to persuade either man to adopt any version of the match that would actually excite the paying crowd. If this was an attempt to humble the volatile Maeda, it had backfired. Pro wrestling had been exposed as a complete mess: without the cooperation of both parties, and with Andre in that condition, a decent match was impossible.