Choice of:

• Two General Admission Tickets to Legends of the Ring Pro Wrestling Fanfest
• Four General Admission Tickets to Legends of the Ring Pro Wrestling Fanfest

Ways to Win a Professional Wrestling Match

Anything can happen once two competitors enter the ring, but the result is always the same: only won can leave the winner. Here’s a glossary of ways a professional wrestling match might make the final bell toll.

• Pinfall: Probably the biggest similarity between greco-roman wrestling and professional wrestling as we know it, the pinfall is how most matches end. One wrestler pins the other’s shoulders against the mat, holding him there as the referee counts to three.
• Submission: Less common but no less suspenseful, submission holds are another common finisher. From Kurt Angle’s Ankle Lock to Ric Flair’s Figure Four Leg Lock, plenty of wrestlers have specialized in putting their competition in a hold so painful that their only means of escape is to surrender the match.
• Countout: If wrestlers leave the ring, whether by choice or by force, they have to return to the ring by the time the ref counts to ten.
• Disqualification: If the referee sees either wrestler break one of the longstanding rules that govern every match, then he has no choice but to disqualify the offender right then and there. Violations may include outside interference from another wrestler, the use of a foreign object, a low blow, or the most egregious offense, an outside interferer low-blowing with a foreign object.

Off the Beaten Path: Win Cases for Special Scenarios

Standard matches most often end with a pinfall, submission, countout, or disqualification, but pro wrestling is filled with crazy variations that have unique endgames of their own.

• Climbing a Ladder: During a ladder match, the only path to victory is up a ladder to physically retrieve a championship belt or other sort of prize (title fight contract, pink slip, basket of apples, etc.) suspended over the ring.
• Touching the Ground: With dozens of wrestlers in the ring, battle royales require different rules to cut through the chaos. Instead of taking competition down on the mat, wrestlers look to throw one another over the top rope. Once a wrestler’s feet touch the ground outside the ring, they’re eliminated, with nothing to show for their effort but a new scuff on their wrestling boot.
• Filling a Casket: In a particularly macabre variation, casket matches end when one wrestler rolls his competition into an open casket on one side of the ring.
• Quitting: Quitting is frowned on in most situations, but especially in the “I quit” match. This variation throws out all rules and regulations, only ending when one of the wrestlers utters the phrase, “I quit.”