Just over a week ago at Forbidden Door, the joint pay per view between AEW and New Japan pro Wrestling, WIll Ospreay delivered a devastating, wince-worthy, face-melting move to Kenny Omega: the tiger driver 91.

It’s got a lot of people talking. Hell it even got its own t shirt.

But what is the tiger driver ‘91 and whats ths history behind it?

To answer that, we need to go back to a man who may just be the greatest pro wrestler who ever lived: Mitsuharu Misawa.

Or do we?

While Misawa popularized the move, coined the name and is most closely associated with it. It was actually 1980s Joshi wrestling star Jaguar Yokota who innovated it.

Now as far as Misawa goes, the Tiger Driver ‘91 was a super finisher reserved for his toughest opponents and most difficult wars.

We’re talking about All Japan pro Wrestling in the 90s – this is King’s Road. The more you face the same opponent, the more devastating the moves get, the more intense the fights are, and the harder it is to put them down for a three count. The Tiger Driver ‘91 was an escalation of the Tiger Bomb, a sitout powerbomb Misawa was already using.

We first see him use it January 26th, 1991, hence the name, against fellow pillar of heaven Akira Taue. It would be used sparingly over the next 15 years as a last resort weapon of near guaranteed victory. Perhaps the most famous use of the move was against longtime rival Toshiaki Kawada in 1994. As intense as as the omega-ospreay instance was, Kawada probably took the worst tiger driver of all time

Very few people ever kicked out of Misawa’s tiger driver 91, the great Kenta Kobashi being a notable exception and repeatedly surviving it.

#wwe #aew #wrestling