Triple H Delivered A Pedigree That Could've Ruined This Wrestler's Career

Paul "Triple H" Levesque is one of the most recent inductees to the WWE Hall of Fame, and for good reason. Over his decades-long career with WWE, Levesque has been behind some of WWE's most iconic eras and moments, from the formation of D-generation X to Seth Rollins' betrayal of his SHIELD brothers. One of Levesque's most recognizable contributions to the industry, however, is his finisher: the Pedigree. Levesque's kneeling take on the facebuster has won him some of the most high-stakes matches in his career, and yet the move that many fans take for granted can be incredibly dangerous if not done correctly or modified properly. Levesque himself learned that the hard way, as a Pedigree attempt gone awry nearly ended the career of one of his early opponents.

The first half of 1996 was tumultuous for "The Game," as the year's first six months saw Levesque — then known as Hunter Hearst Helmsley — suffer his first WWF loss and a following loss against The Ultimate Warrior at WrestleMania XII. Things came to a head for Helmsley during a June episode of "WWE Superstars," when Helmsley was slated to take on Marty Garner in singles action. As the match approached its close, Helmsley attempted to land the Pedigree on Garner. Garner, however, misinterpreted the move's set-up as a sign of an incoming powerbomb, and when Helmsley dropped to his knees to deliver the finishing blow, Garner instead kicked to launch himself in the air. Gravity took over, and by the time Levesque's knees hit the mat, Garner became inverted, and landed squarely on his head, resulting in a horrifying visual that could have easily resulted in compressive neck damage. In later interviews, Garner confessed that he was unaware of "The Game's" finishing move, and genuinely mistook it for a Powerbomb.

While rumors of a Garner-led lawsuit against WWE circulated the professional wrestling grapevine for decades following the incident, Garner himself shut down those rumors in a recent interview. According to Garner, he was simply pleased to have an opportunity to wrestle with the largely successful promotion, and noted Levesque's shocked backstage behavior after the match.

"He just shook his head, like he couldn't believe I was living and standing there talking to him," Garner recalled. "I wasn't proud of that, really, because I messed up."

Despite worries of "scaring" then-WWE executive Vince McMahon with his self-proclaimed "spot monkey" antics, Garner went on to have several more appearances on various WWF programs, where he was mostly used to put over other stars such as Jim Neidhart. Despite the harrowing experience, Garner is still wrestling occasionally under the name "Cham-Pain," and his most recent in-ring endeavor saw him retain his Tarheel Championship Wrestling Heavyweight Title against Joe Locklear in April 2024.

As for Levesque, the incident with Garner caused "The Game" to significantly alter the move to improve its overall safety. Levesque began to regularly communicate with newer talent to ensure they knew how to take the Pedigree, as Garner confessed that he was too embarrassed to let Levesque know he wasn't aware of how to receive the move. The Hall of Famer also began releasing their arms immediately after leaping into the move's iconic kneeling position so that talent could break their face-first fall with their arms and avoid any neck damage. Levesque also evolved the move to be safer on himself, as early iterations of the move resulted in several torn quads for "The Game," and demanded he change the move in order to preserve his own in-ring career.

It seems that his safety measures have worked tremendously, as for the rest of his decorated, decades-long career, Levesque continued using the Pedigree. Save from a one-off botch at Summerslam 2000 that resulted in a concussed Kurt Angle, Levesque has thankfully not relived any Garner incidents, and is currently a 14-time world champion and WWE's CCO and head of creative.