Deathmatches: How they came to be and what their place is in Professional Wrestling today

Like any other form of entertainment, it's expected that professional wrestling will garner a wide variety of tastes. Some will enjoy flippy-do high spots, others may cream their britches at the sight of masterful technical exhibitions, and there are also who love seeing Joey Ryan comically suplexing fools with the shear strength of his wiener. But then there are some who crave a little more violence. Some who crave seeing a jabroni getting smacked around with a barbed wire bat or slammed through glass plates.

While I'm not certainly the biggest fan of it (give me my strong-style puros and I'll be a happy boy), I will occasionally binge on a healthy portion of deathmatches. For some reason, I seem to find myself fascinated with them. How raw and visceral they are, the fact performers are willing to go so far to tell a story in the ring (no matter how ludicrous it may be) is, in some way, rather admirable. But that begs the question: Do deathmatches still have a place in wrestling? Should they? Where should the line be drawn when it comes to violence? Well, before I answer that, I feel it's important to look at the history first, to see where hardcore wrestling started and it evolved into the deathmatches we know today.

The History

While the matches certainly didn't get to deathmatch levels, professional wrestling starting getting notably more violent than its collar-and-elbow tie-up roots around the 50's and 60's. In the Florida and Texas territories of the National Wrestling Alliance, fans saw the Brass Knuckles Championship get regularly defended by the likes of Eddie Graham, Jose Lothario and the Funk Family. While more north in the Detroit, Michigan area, they were treated to the violent tactics of The Sheik and Abdullah The Butcher, who relied on various weapons such as pencils, fireballs and forks.

Then Atsushi Onita happened. Essentially, he saw American hardcore wrestling and thought, "Hmm. That's cute. Why don't I literally turn this shit up to 11?" Onita formed Frontier Martial Arts Wrestling in 1989, ushering in a new phase of hardcore wrestling. By employing various new means of violence (barbed wire, bricks, thumbtacks, explosives, etc.), FMW helped evolve hardcore wrestling into the deathmatch style we know today. It also saw various Japanese promotions follow in its footsteps, such as W*NG, IWA Japan and later Big Japan Pro Wrestling, which is still in operation today.

Extreme Championship Wrestling took a good deal of influence from its Japanese predecessors when it came to making pro wrasslin' more EXTREME, even incorporating such talents as Terry Funk, Cactus Jack (better known as Mick Foley) and Sabu who had previously competed in the aforementioned Japanese promotions. It also saw the rise of homegrown talents such as Tommy Dreamer, New Jack and The Rotten Brothers. While certainly not as extravagant as its Japanese predecessors, ECW certainly didn't shy away from the violence, evidenced by the notorious Barbed Wire Deathmatch between Sabu and Funk, as well as the Taipei Deathmatch between The Rotten Brothers or pretty much anything involving New Jack (no knives around him, please).

When it came to American wrestling promotions, none more embraced the O.G. Japanese Deathmatch style than Combat Zone Wrestling. Starting around the later days of ECW, CZW adopted the Jesus Fucking Christ-levels of hardcore in Japan and brought the same levels of intensity to the states, implementing such kinds of brutality as The Tournament of Death and Ultraviolent Underground Championship, among others; they even worked with BJW for a spell in 2000. One could argue it upped the ante of its predecessors (as pictured below). It's still in operation, employing the same levels of extreme levels of wrestling violence to this day.

The bloody meat of the matter

So with the history being laid out (probably more detailed than necessary, but I'm a nerd, deal with it), it's time to address some questions, first: What role do deathmatches play in professional wrestling today? The answer is quite simple really: it's another outlet of wrestling for fans to consume, albeit a more visceral, violent one. Like it or not, you have to acquiesce that, at the very least, it offers wrestling fans something different than what they're used to.

The second question to ask: Should they have a role? Is it necessary? Well, for necessity's sake, certainly not. While any form of entertainment needs to change with the times, there was really never a need to make professional wrestling look exceptionally gruesome (syringes seem like a bit much). As for whether they should have a role, that's a bit more difficult to answer. Pro wrestling has a wide diaspora of fans. Some may clamor for more violence, but others take a look at something like CZW and despise what they see. While wrestling fans shouldn't feel the need to see their favorite (or least favorite) grapplers covered in blood and wielding sharp instruments, deathmatches nevertheless provide an outlet for those wrasslin' fans who hunger for a bit more violence.

It's also important to take a look at the health and well-being of the talent involved. Deathmatches are obviously risky and can produce injurious consequences . One such case involves Abdullah The Butcher (who I previously mentioned) and the wrestler Devon Nicholson. Abdullah, who has been carrying Hepatitis-C (a blood-borne virus) was in a particularly bloody match with Nicholson in 2007. Not long after, Nicholson also developed Hep-C, leading to Nicholson to sue him successfully over the incident. Thankfully, a lesson was learned from this incident. For example, CZW requires every wrestler wishing to participate in the Tournament of Death to receive a blood test, and have a medical staff on hand at their shows.

But where is the line drawn? Marc McAndrews, a professional photographer and avid wrestling fan, asked this same question. In a 2015 interview with CNN, McAndrews said, "This is a question I'm asking myself, and I don't necessarily have the answer: But what's disturbing me about this type of wrestling and the blood and the sport and the theatrics of it, and why am I OK with watching 'Reservoir Dogs'?" He continued to say, "Why am I watching the fights in the hockey highlights? Why is the blood in mixed martial arts and boxing almost less offensive than what's in the death matches? And why is the violence on TV and movies less offensive than this?"

That's the question we as wrestling fans should be asking ourselves. Should we be so judgmental? Why can some of us be appalled at deathmatch wrestling, yet at the same time be so okay and even celebrate violence in movies and tv shows? "BUT ANDREW," you say in a most likely nasally and judgmental voice, "MOVIES AND TV SHOWS ARE FAKE, AND NO ONE REALLY GETS HURT FROM THEM." To which I say, you're right to some extent. It's simulated violence on a controlled set. But, accidents happen and people get hurt, just like in deathmatch wrestling. And not just deathmatch wrestling. Gruesome accidents can happen at anytime in any variation of professional wrestling, and simulated popular entertainment in general for that matter.

I'm not trying to say people who deride deathmatch wrestling are out-and-out hypocrites; I can sympathize with their sentiments. As I said before, I'm really not even that big a fan of it. What I'm trying to say is we need to look at both sides of the coin. Take a walk in the shoes of the fans, and the wrestlers themselves, and see why they do it. See why they enjoy it. You don't have to like the product, but at least understand why others might. And it isn't going win any popularity contests anytime soon. It still very much retains a cult fanbase who enjoy the product for what it is. It's not for everybody, but then again, neither is professional wrestling as a whole.

So it might not hurt to ease up on it a bit. Or don't. Your choice, really.

Sources: 
https://www.cultofwhatever.com/2012/04/there-will-be-blood-the-brief-history-of-hardcore-wrestling/

http://www.onlineworldofwrestling.com/information/death-match/

https://www.cnn.com/2015/08/06/us/cnnphotos-hardcore-wrestling-death-matches/index.html

http://www.wrestling-titles.com/us/tx/w/nwa/sw-bk.html

http://www.wrestling-titles.com/us/fl/fl-bk.html

https://deadspin.com/wrestler-wins-hepatitis-c-lawsuit-against-abdullah-the-1585891157

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ps0NJ2Sq8D4