5 current WWE finishers and their true inventors

Many a time, it is the finishing move of a wrestler that defines him/her. No big match feels like one if it doesn't end owing to a great move leaving the opponent prone on the mat.

There wouldn't have been a Steve Austin without the Stone Cold Stunner and Randy Orton's character would not have been complete without the RKO.

But Orton did not invent the RKO -- it was an extension of Diamond Dallas Page's Diamond Cutter. Similarly, Austin did not invent the Stunner either -- that was the creation of Austin's fellow ECW alumnus Mickey Whipreck who called it the Whipper Snapper.

This list takes a look at five current WWE finishing moves and the men who invented it.

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#5 Superkick - Chris Adams

Dolph Ziggler has been using the Superkick as his finisher for some time now, giving it precedence over his other finisher -- The Zigzag. Ziggler isn't the first WWE Superstar to use the manoeuvre -- the fact that is barely hidden with his corner stomp which basically amounts to him being a Shawn Michaels ripoff.

But even before Michaels made the Sweet Chin Music famous, a man had already used it as his finisher -- he was none other than the 'Gentleman' Chris Adams.

Adams, who would train Steve Austin and Scott Hall in his later years, used the Superkick on such stalwarts like the Dynamite Kid and Davey Boy Smith and had a memorable feud against the Von Erichs in WCCW.

A trained judoka, Adams passed away in 2001.

#4 John Laurinaitis - RKO

Some one in this picture invented the RKO

We all know that the RKO is a modification of the Diamond Cutter. But was DDP's WCW finisher original? The answer is no.

The man who created the manoeuvre that became the Diamond Cutter and then the RKO is none other than one of the worst on-screen authority figures in WWE history, John Laurinaitis. Wrestling as Johny Ace, Laurinaitis came up with a snap neck breaker move that was called the Ace Crusher.

The Ace Crusher was widely successful in Japan and has been imitated numerous times. This might just be one of the many unknown facts about WWE Senior Producer Laurinaitis, who has recently married Kathy Colace, mother of Brie and Nikki Bella.

#3 Black Gordman - DDT

Dean Ambrose and Bobby Roode might use variations of the DDT as their finishers and Jake Roberts might be synonymous with the name of the move, but it was actually a territory wrestler named Black Gordman who used it for the first time.

Wrestling for the NWA in Los Angeles, Gordman called it the Diamond Twist. He did not receive wide spread acclaim for the move as he did not wrestle in the popular territories and Jake Roberts has been hailed as the father of the DDT.

However, Gordman is well known in Mexico, belonging to the same family as the likes of Dos Caras and Alberto Del Rio.

#2 Etsuko Mita - F5/ Attitude Adjustment

A devastating move in the hands of someone like Lesnar

It might be unfathomable to think when John Cena introduced his Attitude Adjustment finisher, he was ripping off the hottest move in WWE at the time, Brock Lesnar's F5.

While it has passed 13 years, the landscape in the WWE remains eerily similar. Lesnar is still the most popular Superstar on the roster and the F-5 is the most devastating manoeuvre.

While Cena has grown into a legend and the earlier name of the AA -- The FU -- has been swept under the carpet, one thing that is true is that neither Cena nor Lesnar was the innovator of the move.

It was a female Japanese wrestler Etsuko Mita, who invented the concept of carrying an opponent over the shoulder and then slamming him/her on to the mat. The move went through several modifications including the Fireman's carry slam and the Death Valley Driver since then.

Mita's original version looks to be more devastating than the finishers of both Cena and Lesnar, though.

#1 Paul Heyman - Chokeslam

The Chokeslam has been used by several big men of the WWE

The Chokeslam is an iconic move -- a Superstar having the Chokeslam in his arsenal was instantly considered to be a main event player. A bastion of heavyweights like The Undertaker, The Big Show and Kane, the move is literally synonymous for a 300-plus pounder heavy hitter, even though the likes of The Hurricane has used it as his finisher too.

It would be interesting to note that it wasn't any of the super heavyweights who invented the move -- it was not even a wrestler. It was Paul Heyman who came up with the idea of the move in ECW while looking at an effective way of introducing his new heel 911.

911 used the move to terrorise opponents and joined Heyman's heel stable 'The Dangerous Alliance' alongside Sabu and Taz. While he destroyed Doink the Clown with four straight Chokeslams once, his last match in ECW -- having fallen out of favour with Heyman -- was a sub one-minute loss to Spike Dudley, of all people.