WWE villain Kevin Owens used a piledriver on rival Randy Orton on SmackDown and fans still can’t get enough of it. Under the stewardship of Head of Creative and Chief Content Officer Paul ‘Triple H’ Levesque , WWE’s storylines and rivalries have been given a little more room to develop and breathe. That’s lead to plenty of praise from fans who’ve enjoyed watching finer details and longer-term storytelling as a result.
There has been perhaps no better example of less meaning more under the ‘Triple H regime’ than the segment on Friday night’s episode of the blue brand show between Owens and Orton . Owens has recently turned heel – the wrestling terminology for a good guy or hero turning into a rouge villain - after months of simmering tension. The Canadian had been aligned with Cody Rhodes and Orton but turned on the former after The American Nightmare’s teaming with Roman Reigns – and then swiftly turned his ire on The Viper, too.
That reached a peak on Friday when Owens attacked Orton with a move long since removed from WWE in the piledriver, which was for many years a staple in a wrestler’s offence. It famously broke the neck of icon Stone Cold Steve Austin in 1997. In a match for the Intercontinental Championship against Owen Hart at SummerSlam , Austin was dropped on his head in an errant execution of the move, suffering compression of the spinal cord.
Austin went on to achieve global stardom in WWE but has always attributed the incident with cutt.
