Felix Upton on July 15, 2025
Marc Mero didn’t invent the shooting star press in the ring—he did it on a lake in New York when he was just a teenager.
In a recent sit-down with The Wrestling Classic, the former WWE and WCW star opened up about how his iconic finishing move, the “Wild Thing,” actually originated years before his pro wrestling career ever started.
Mero explained that he and his friends would compete at Green Lakes near Syracuse, New York, trying to one-up each other with wild flips off the diving board. That’s where the prototype of his move was born.
“When I was a kid, we would go to this place called Green Lakes, near Syracuse, New York. At the lake, they had diving boards. There’d be hundreds of people around waiting in line to go on the boards. I had a bunch of crazy friends—I was always with guys that were a little out there, including myself—and we’d see how many flips we could do in a row. Even if we landed on our back, we’d just do crazy stuff. And believe it or not, the Mero, which is—you jump up, spin in the air, hit the ropes, and do the flip—that was invented when I was 16 years old on a diving board. I always knew I could do it.”
He said the inspiration to bring it into wrestling came years later after watching Jushin Thunder Liger perform a similar move in Japan.
“When I saw Jushin Liger do it in Japan, I thought, ‘Wow, that’s the coolest move.’ No one ever did it in WWE at the time. Billy Kidman did it in WCW, but his was more laid out. I wanted to do a tuck and open up—like a beautiful jump. We called it the Wild Thing, and it kind of took off.”
But the flash came with a price. Mero admitted that doing the Wild Thing regularly started to wear down his body—especially his knees and shoulders.
“The bad thing about it is, when you have a finishing move and you’re wrestling night after night, and they want you to do your finish every night… it takes its toll on your knees. You’re landing with all that trajectory on your hands and knees because you want to protect the guy—you don’t want to land on him. So you take the fall mostly on your own. It started really affecting my knees and shoulders.”
Because of the wear and tear, Mero later switched to the TKO—a fireman’s carry cutter he was allowed to use with Diamond Dallas Page’s blessing.
Marc Mero’s Wild Thing might’ve been born on a diving board, but it left a major impression on wrestling fans long after it hit the ring.
Have you ever seen a finisher so cool it made you want to try it yourself? Drop your thoughts and share your favorite high-risk wrestling move in the comments.
Please credit Ringside News if you use the above transcript in your publication.
July 15, 2025 7:10 am
Disqus Comments Loading...