>watch old match
>nearly 15 minutes of trading headlock variations before the match actually starts
how did boomers tolerate this?

>>18219675 (OP)
Whereas now, they flippy pippy all over the arena, and even fewer people tolerate it as it death spirals. Maybe it was about the characters after all.

>>18219675 (OP)
>headlock variations
thats wrestling and that style used to draw all the money

>>18219675 (OP)
Japanese wrestling is pretty similar (trading headlocks and basic holds until the wrestlers start going for bigger moves) so it's not just boomers.

>IT USED TO LOOK LIKE A FIGHT DAMMIT, PEOPLE THOUGHT IT WAS REAL
>the worst fucking punches you've ever seen

name 3 matches where this happens

>>18219934
>the worst fucking punches you've ever seen
You're making it sound like Western fight choreography was even good back then. Most people then had never seen anything but punches in boxing, and some 60s and 70s movies.

>>18219970
Yeah, MMA really destroyed the mystique of pro-wrestling, because it showed how real fighting looked.
Pre-MMA, most people didn't know better. Pro-wrestling was the closest we had to "just straight up fighting" (yes, there was boxing and traditional martial arts but I mean without the strict rules that define those).

>>18219675 (OP)
Just simply a lack of knowledge and no high quality tv/internet to get them desensitized. You could make people in the crowd faint with a slow running elbow back in the day.

>>18219934
>PEOPLE THOUGHT IT WAS REAL
The biggest myth about old wrestling. People have known it's fake almost as long as it's been fake.

>>18219934
this pig shits his pants when he sees two broken down japs throw the softest forearms

>>18220307
You've obviously never been in a real fight dude.
If you had, you'd know that weak forearms are foreplay before doing a triple summersault off an elevated platform.

>>18219675 (OP)
By watching the rest of the manoeuvres, arm drags and back and forths that often precede a headlock of some variety.
Not everyone did the headlock all the time either. Bret Hart favoured 1 limb in particular, usually the leg so he can do the sharpshooter.
Others do armbars and so on.
It's the bit of professional wrestling that actually is wrestling, the grapples and the submission holds.
Flipflopping is acrobatically impressive and a visual treat but it's not wrestling. Just happens to be done by athletes in the square circle instead of on top of a trapeze.

>>18220073
so do it

>>18219675 (OP)
There brains hadn't been ruined by TikTok.

>>18219675 (OP)
Retards