Swerve (professional wrestling)

A swerve is fairly common in professional wrestling. It is when a wrestler suddenly turns against another wrestler who is supposedly his friend. This is a start to a feud and an angle between the two wrestlers that would explain the reasons for the swerve. While the purpose of a swerve is to surprise the fans, poor booking may result in some very predictable or senseless swerves.

Some examples of swerves:

• When David Arquette was about to be given the WCW World Heavyweight Title, he befriended Diamond Dallas Page, whom he co-starred with in the movie Ready to Rumble. Arquette did win the title with DDP's help, but he turned on Page and handed the title to heel Jeff Jarrett. The following night, Arquette cut a promo telling DDP that he should not have trusted him.

• WWE wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin competed in a tournament for the World Title. He was in a match with Mick Foley (then wrestling as Mankind), who had Vince McMahon in his corner. Vince had feuded with his son Shane, who was forced to work as a WWE referee at the time, and who had been a face on the same side as Austin. During Austin's match against Foley, Vince pulled the referee out of the ring so Shane entered as a replacement just as Austin hit his finisher on Foley. However, Shane stopped his count at two, gave Austin a middle finger gesture (a gesture commonly delivered by Austin), and revealed that he was in cahoots with Vince all along.

• In the finals of the same tournament, it was The Rock against Mick Foley. In the weeks prior to this pay-per-view, Vince made it clear to the fans that he hated The Rock and was on Foley's side. But during the match, Rock had Foley locked in a Sharpshooter. Vince told the time keeper to ring the bell even though Foley did not submit, in an incident reminiscent of the Montreal Screwjob. At the end of the match, Rock and Vince told Foley that it was all a set-up orchestrated by the two.

• During WCW's nWo angle, swerves were seen almost every week as many wrestlers would rather betray their friends and join the New World Order than be one of their victims. Buff Bagwell turned against his tag team partner Scotty Riggs. Paul Wight (as The Giant) attacked the members of his former stable, the Dungeon of Doom, in order to be accepted into the nWo. Sting was believed to have joined the nWo as well (but it was actually an imposter, portrayed by wrestler Jeff Farmer). Most notably, Eric Bischoff also became a member, using his authority to "fire" WCW employees who got in the nWo's way.