This is a legitimately
dangerous move, as if the
victim's head is too close to the ground at the beginning of the move, he will actually land on his head and severely injure his
neck. The idea is to have it so that the victim's head ends up a few
inches from the ground, but close enough so that the
executor's legs obscure that fact to everyone watching.
Stone Cold Steve Austin was,
in fact, severely injured as a result of a
botched piledriver at the hands of
Owen Hart at
SummerSlam '97. Austin's head was too low, and he landed straight onto his head and, as one might expect, suffered severe
neck damage. Austin indeed was
paralyzed for about a minute after the move, but luckily recovered some feeling in his
arms and
legs as Hart was
heckling the
fans to buy Austin some time. It took him several months to recover fully from the
incident.
In
The Rock's
autobiography, he also details an
incident that occurred while he was in
primary school, wherein one of his classmates was prodding him about
wrestling being
fake. In response,
The Rock placed the kid in a
piledriver, messed it up, and ended up hurting the kid pretty badly.
So, like they say,
do not try this at home!