Except for Billy Gunn, who still gets in the ring on occasion in AEW, the members of D-Generation X have all hung up their wrestling boots. The stable’s influence lives on, however, and one of the most obvious ways is through the DX crotch chop.
An easy and readily understandable way to show disrespect toward an opponent (even without DX’s “two words”), the crotch chop makes semi-regular appearances across televised wrestling, and not just in WWE. But who was the first member of D-Generation X to start doing it? Shawn Michaels addressed that question in a new interview with the New York Post.
“The first place I remember seeing it was Sean Waltman, who was then known as 1-2-3 Kid and later X-Pac, doing it over in the UK,” Michaels told the Post. “Then all of a sudden, we were doing it as a group, to each other, kind of thinking it was funny.”
Michaels said the crotch chop was just one of the things that eventually made their way into DX promos that members of the group — which at its peak included Triple H, Chyna, Road Dogg and Gunn, along with Michaels and Waltman — found amusing while doing to each other.
“From a television standpoint, as we started to do DX, it just felt kind of natural,” Michaels said. “A lot of things that we did on TV as DX were things we were doing as friends behind the scenes long before we ever brought it to TV.”
So the definitive answer on who to credit (or blame, depending on your point of view) for the DX crotch chop is on the record. Thank you, Sean Waltman, for making it acceptable to motion emphatically toward your groin, at least among friends. Here’s hoping there’s still the occasional callback to DX’s glory days for years to come.