Wrestling Terms

Here is a short dictionary of some commonly used wrestling terms.
You'll probably notice that some of the same terms are used more
than once, but they're pretty easy to tell apart in context.

"Babyface" (or just "Face") - A good guy.

"Blade" - When a wrestler cuts himself with a razor blade to
bleed during a match.

"Booker" - The person who writes the angles and determines who
wins each match.  Sometimes, there is a "booking committee" who
decides these things.

"Calling the spot" - When wrestlers talk to each other in the
ring to decide what move they'll do next.

"Dark match" - Match at a TV taping where the match is taped, but
usually only with the long shot.  The hand held cameras aren't
used.  They are often used as "main events" for TV taping cards,
and "tryout" matches.

"Do a Job" - To lose to.  For example, "Hulk Hogan did a job for
The Undertaker at the Survivor Series."

"Draw heat" - Evoke lots of crowd response.

"Go over" - To be popular.  For example, "PN News is going over"
means he is popular.

"Good worker" - A wrestler who performs wrestling holds and
maneuvers well.  For example, "Ric Flair and Mr Perfect are two of
the best workers in the business."

"Heat" - Lots of vocal crowd response.

"Heel" - A bad guy.

"House show" - A wrestling show put on in a local arena which is
not going to be televised.

"Jobber" - One of those wrestlers who always wrestle the big name
stars on the TV shows and always lose.

"Juice" - To bleed, usually from blading.

"Mark" - A wrestling fan who doesn't know the angles and stories.

"On the Juice" - Using steroids.  In addition, when used as a
noun, "juice" often times refers to steroids.

"Put over" - To make another wrestler look good.  For example,
"WCW wrestlers have been trying to put Van Hammer over" means
that all the wrestlers Van Hammer has been wrestling are trying
their best to make Van Hammer look better than he is.

"Run in" - When a manager or other third party (not a tag-team
partner) enters the ring to help a wrestler.

"Screw job" - When there is interference or other blatant
cheating not caught by the referee, such as a wrestler throwing
salt in an opponent's eyes or Jimmy Hart hitting a wrestler with
his megaphone, that helps decide the outcome of a match.  Also
used to describe any non-pinfall finish.

"Sell" - To make it look like a move really, really hurts.

"Sheets" - Newsletters such as Dave Meltzer's Wrestling Observer.

"Shoot" - It really happened, it wasn't a fake.  For example,
"The snake bite on Randy Savage was a shoot" means the snake
really bit him.  Contrast with "Work."

"Squash Match" - A match in which the victor totally dominates
the loser. Often very short, and usually involving a "name"
wrestler vs. a jobber; the point of the match is to promote the
name wrestler.

"Turn" - To change from face to heel or vice versa.  Sometimes
qualified with "Face turn" or "Heel turn" to specify which way
the wrestler is going.

"Work" - Part of the script, it didn't really happen.  For
example, "Jim Neidhart's injury which kept him out of Survivor
Series was a work" means that he wasn't really injured, but
rather the "injury" was part of the storyline.  Contrast with
"Shoot ."

"Work rate" - How the wrestlers performed, in terms of technical
wrestling.  For example, "The work rate in the Hogan/Undertaker
match was poor" means that there were few wrestling maneuvers
executed, and those that were tried were poorly done.