Hooking the leg is almost second nature when wrestlers go for a pinfall victory. Now, Maven is explaining the purpose behind the movement.
Maven regularly explains the ins and outs of professional wrestling on his YouTube channel. In his latest video, he answers wrestling questions posed on Reddit. One of the questions concerns the act of hooking the leg when going for a pin. Maven channeled his WWE Tough Enough trainer, Al Snow, to explain his answer.
According to Maven, Al Snow frequently spoke about how the goal of all wrestlers should be to win the match actively—hooking the leg to further the illusion of trying to ensure your opponent will not kick out.
"Good question. It gives the illusion that you're in a real fight even more; the great wrestlers were phenomenal at adding to the struggle. [Randy] Orton was great at this. Orton would grab the leg and then almost lean his entire back on someone, looking like he was putting pressure down to keep someone's shoulders pinned to that mat, 1-2-3, because, like Al Snow says, 'The whole point of a wrestling match is to pin someone.' So the more you look like you're in a struggle, the more you look like you're fighting to get this person to keep that person's shoulders down, the more the people at home believe ."
So, if you didn't know before, now you know. Hooking the leg is a way to increase the drama in a wrestling match.
Maven has complemented Randy Orton, calling him effortless in between the ropes. Learn more here.
If you use any of the above quotes, please credit Maven's YouTube channel in addition to linking back to this article and giving Fightful credit for transcription.
