Living Dangerously 1999 – Lynn vs. RVD and Sabu vs. Taz…..Again

Living Dangerously 1999
Date: March 21, 1999
Location: Asbury Park Convention Center, Asbury Park, New Jersey
Attendance: 3,900
Commentator: Joey Styles

So Taz is world champion. Yep that’s about all there is to it at this point. Other than that there isn’t a ton going on here. Shane is on his way out and the company is in trouble. They wouldn’t be on national TV for another few months and this is really a dry spell for them.

The problem was no one bought Taz as champion after the “big” win for reasons I’ve already given. Other than that, the main thing here is RVD vs. Lynn starts up. Now I have only seen one of their matches in their seemingly never ending series, so let’s get to this. Yep the card looks like crap. I’m stunned.

Some guy asks Taz what it’s going to be like when there’s the unification match tonight. It’s the FTW Title vs. the ECW Title. Good to know. He calls out Austin and Flair, the other world champions and a bunch of other guys. Give me a break Taz. Fits the character though.

Joey welcomes us to the show. Having the logo on the mat helps a lot. We hype up the main event because we haven’t had Sabu vs. Taz in awhile. Ok then.

Play the theme song monkeys!

Super Crazy vs. Yoshihiro Tajiri

It’s a rematch from the last PPV, which is a good idea as it came from out of nowhere and was awesome. Tajiri’s hair looks more like it would later on so that’s a bit more like it. Apparently there have been other matches and this is the blowoff to it. Now this is a match where I wonder something: how do they call spots? Not trying to sound rude or anything but do they speak the same languages?

We start with a lot of nice looking spots which don’t accomplish anything but they got the crowd impressed so that’s a perk. Big old standing ovation for that and I can’t blame them. Love that handspring elbow. Naturally this is more of a spotfest than a match but that’s all fine and good. If these are on the show, this is where they belong without question. Crazy hits the triple moonsaults which are kind of cool I think.

Wow Crazy is better than I remember him being. This has been all him at this point in case you were wondering and there goes his head from a kick so there we are. I could watch Tajiri kick people all day. Crazy misses a springboard and the crowd seems to think he screwed up. Crazy goes completely away from the match idea and hits a low blow. They set up a second Batista Bomb but they botch the heck out of it so I think Tajiri countered it. After another counter, Crazy gets the pin on a rollup.

Rating: B. Not bad, but way behind their other match. This was certainly entertaining, but at the same time it was miles behind what they did last month. Far more of a spotfest than anything else but at the same time that’s what an opener should do: it got the crowd into it so this was a success.

Van Dam, Sabu and Van Dam say they’ll beat Taz. Van Dam should be world champion, period. You can see the masking tape over the Taz name plate on the FTW belt. That’s awesome.

We see some highlights of the previous match but it’s interrupted by some guy that looks like Sean Waltman from the mid 90s yelling. HOLY CRAP THAT’S STEVE CORINO????? He looks NOTHING like he does now. I mean NOTHING. I honestly didn’t recognize him and that hardly ever happens. He yells out an open challenge and the fans want Sid. We get Balls and Axl instead.

Balls Mahoney vs. Steve Corino

I really can’t get over how different he looks. I’m in awe. Hearing Corino called young is rather amusing. This is all Balls to start. Steve is the heel here. How many times did Rotten actually wrestle? All I remember him doing is screaming and yelling a lot. Mahoney hits a decent frog splash if nothing else.

The fans want to see a chair shot. I’m amazed at how Corino is more or less a jobber here. He always had a sweet superkick. He refuses to use the chair and gets booed. Amazing isn’t it? My mouth is hanging open from that chair shot. He might get up by 2001. Balls wins with ease. Fans were way into it at least.

Rating: D. Seriously, Mahoney just beat Corino. Even as a jobber, that’s not right ever. This was like 4 minutes long so how good can they make it? Steve was a total jobber if nothing else anyway. Total filler of 7 minutes counting intros here.

We recap the Dudleys vs. the Gangstas which wound up with Mustapha turning on New Jack to set up their match tonight.

Little Guido vs. Antifaz del Norte

No one knows who the other guy is. Big Sal is the only one with Guido tonight. There’s a really long stall to start. I’m sure there’s an epic story behind this and it’s not just a randomly thrown together match at all. His name means Mask of the North or North Mask in case you were curious for no apparent reason. The fans are shall we say restless although the Mask guy isn’t bad. The fans want Tracy Smothers.

We get a big chop battle that leads nowhere. Russian legsweep from the middle rope and you can make your own ethnical jokes. The fans chant boring and I mean they chant it LOUDLY. Sal likes to curse a lot. He ENDS the masked guy with a powerslam through the table at ringside. A Sicilian (Walls of Jericho) Crab ends it and we get the bad FBI music. Smothers and Rich come out and beat up Guido until Sal chases them off.

Rating: D-. And that’s all on the masked guy. I have no idea who he was and I have no idea where he went after this. He was pretty good though which makes up a bit for Guido being completely uninteresting. Why was this on PPV again?

TV Title: Rob Van Dam vs. Jerry Lynn

Ok let’s see if this lives up to the hype still. Van Dam gets an epic pop. Still gets nowhere near the main event or the world title. I’m stunned. Oh and he and Sabu are the tag champions again. Paul, take a good look at RVD. He’s the reason you’re out of business. The fact that you simply never made him the main guy killed your company.

Well among other things but that could have gotten you a lot of cash at the end. Lynn is a guy that the more I see the more I like. Apparently Van Dam is supposed to win in a walk. ECW needs to stop the close-ups. They do a swank sequence of can you top this which is working for me. Lynn took his freaking head off with a clothesline there. Van Dam likes to stall. A lot.

In a funny spot Lynn drops a leg on the back of his neck when he does that split move. Perfect timing on it too so it looked great. Lynn shows off his leaping too and hits a spinning crossbody to the floor. The psychology here is that Lynn is doing basic stuff to counter Van Dam’s high stuff. Apparently one of the fans loves a girl named Melissa.

We’re in the crowd now with a bunch of jumps and flips from Van Dam. Entertaining if nothing else. Van Dam tells D-Von Alfonso to get the table. Oh wait it’s a chair. That’s better. I will never be able to avoid cringing at the surfboard. That’s just insane. Not big on the chair stuff here but with Van Dam they never booked him right anyway so it works.

SWEET counter as Lynn hits a counter to something into a springboard into a powerbomb onto a chair. Better than it sounds. Van Dam takes a reverse DDT onto the chair for two. The chair is laying on the mat for the most part which is annoying but bearable I guess. Apparently Lynn is the new F’ING show. Fonzie makes the save for Van Dam as Lynn was up top with the chair.

And Lynn goes off the top and through a table against his own wishes. Lynn has been down a LONG time. Jerry stops the attack with a chair to stop the split legged moonsault. I love pinfall reversal sequences and apparently the crowd does too. The speed here is great. Van Dam takes a tornado DDT from the apron onto the table. Note that it wasn’t through it. That was scary looking.

Hey we’re back in the ring again. Lynn hits a nice jumping DDT for two…and we get a bell? The referee tries to hand him the belt as he’s making a decision. Uh, WHAT? Lynn wants five more minutes. And for once that’s what we’re going to get. That decision has boggled my mind. See my mind? It’s boggled now.

Who in the world would do that? RVD hits the Van Daminator and the Five Star to take over from nowhere and get the pin. There might have been two more minutes after Overtime started, making me wonder WHAT THE FREAKING POINT TO IT WAS. They shake hands after the match which is always cool.

Rating: B. I said to X in the Board Room that I didn’t know if this was good or not but it was certainly entertaining and I think that holds up actually. It’s certainly entertaining, but the referee making the decision thing was just WEIRD. I mean have you ever heard of that before? Still though, this was full of sweet spots and while there was little flow to it, the oh crap factor makes up for that so I’ll take it.

Ah apparently the main event WILL NOT have a pre determined winner. Got it.

We kind of recap Taz vs. Sabu. Why is that so hard for them to get right?

Jasmine St. Claire, an adult actress, says she’s the new queen of wrestling. Cue Francine. This was earlier in the night. And the point of this was…?

Mustapha Saed vs. New Jack

Oh dear. Oh dear indeed. Mustapha paid off the Dudleys to beat some guys up, including new Jack. Can someone shoot that stupid song? I beg of you. Oh dear. It’s a bunch of weapons shots. The main ones are a keyboard and a plastic lawnmower a 2 year old would like. New Jack swings a guitar that breaks before it hits Mustapha.

Oh dear. We hit the crowd and you can feel the balcony dive coming. Mustapha is taped to the table and there goes New Jack. Yep there he goes. Nope it doesn’t mean much as he does it every time. And after being walked back to the ring that’s enough for the pin.

Rating: N/A. Dude, New Jack, you can’t wrestle. Let it go. This wasn’t wrestling so I can’t grade it.

And here are the Dudleys. They beat up New Jack until a bunch of guys come out to save him. Joel does his intro and it’s pretty weak. Bubba starts talking, still as a country hick. They don’t have a match or anything as they’re just here talking. It’s open challenge time.

Spike Dudley/Nova vs. Dudley Boys

And of course within a minute we have Spike thrown into the crowd and he’s surfed around. His leg hit the rail on the fall though so the sound was really bad. Nova looks like Hurricane in blue and black here. He gets a Bubba Bomb from the middle rope and 3D. Ok let’s move on. Ring announcer gets 3D. DANG Spike has been surfed around for a long time.

Bubba talks again and says there’s no one left. Something tells me that a certain monster named Sid will be here soon as he was featured in the opening video and he happens to be an unstoppable monster. Bubba offers to fight the crowd. Judge Jeff Jones comes down with a stretcher and yep there’s Sid. Sid blowing bubbles while Bubba yells at him is funny. SID SELLS SOMETHING! I’m in SHOCK.

Fans are WAY into Sid who hits a double chokeslam. Sid destroys them and…here’s Spike again. Sid beats up D-Von on the ramp and Spike hits the Acid Drop…for the pin. Sure. Why not? Spike gets powerbombed too. Sid would be gone in a few months for WCW. And there’s another powerbomb through a table conveniently placed on the floor.

Rating: D-. The fans popped HUGE for Sid but other than that this was just a total mess. The idea that the match was still going on all that time is nothing short of idiotic and it shows very well why Heyman’s booking was so crazy at times. This should have been Sid comes out and beats people up. Spike and Nova simply weren’t needed.

We recap Shane leaving ECW which hasn’t actually happened yet but should have happened about 6 months before this. The fans of course don’t want the biggest heel in company history to go. The Impact Players argue over who gets to be the next Franchise. Shane says Dreamer gets to carry on the legacy of Shane. There are too many jokes there than I have time to type. The Impact Players beat up Shane and Francine to a ballad for some reason and Dreamer is beaten up too.

Tommy Dreamer/Shane Douglas vs. Impact Players

This is more or less Shane’s final big deal in ECW. Dawn Marie is pretending to be Beaulah at this point for no apparent reason. Oh Storm is Dreamer and Justin is Douglas. I get it now. Francine’s looks were WAY underrated. Shane of course went from being the top heel for like ever to being loved because he wanted to retire which is a wrestling tradition. Of course he was in WCW in like 2 months.

Shane in long tights is just weird looking. This new ring announcer kind of sucks. Dawn Marie dressed like Beulah: WIN. Great heat on Storm here. And we’ve already got double teaming. Something tells me this is going to get insane soon. Justin won’t come in to fight Shane. Ok never mind yes he will. Shane hits a nice rolling suplex set. Always loved that kind of thing. Dreamer hooks the absolute worst abdominal stretch I have ever seen. I mean it looks AWFUL.

The heels are dominating as Dawn apparently has herpes. Justin isn’t that good, period. Storm does one of the worst spot calls this side of Shawn Michaels. We get a TOTALLY random Ric Flair sucks chant. Credible screams for mercy which is rather amusing. This isn’t quite a fully fledged disaster but it’s reaching the outer limits of Disasteria.

This is more or less heel dominance for the most part, which tells me that the faces will get the win in the end. It’s weird but whenever the faces take over the crowd dies a bit, even though they’re all over the heels. Most odd indeed. They’re setting up for the big hot tag to Shane by having Dreamer get the heck beaten out of him.

Shane comes in and offers to reform the Triple Threat and then screws over the Players by hitting a double clothesline. Ok that was pointless but whatever. Dawn hits a low blow on Shane while Jazz distracts the referee. You know, because the referee wouldn’t hear the screaming she was doing. Cat fight ensues of course. This is still pure heel domination.

And here’s Francine with a ladder. Sure why not? Dreamer hits the DDT on Justin into Lance’s balls. Justin kicks out of the belly to belly. Oh I’m so shocked. Maybe he managed to do that because IT’S JUST A FREAKING SUPLEX! Francine stops a cane shot and kicks Justin in the head to set up the Pittsburgh Plunge for the pin.

Replay shows Justin looking over his shoulder to make sure she was there for the spot. Post match Cyrus comes out and causes the Impact Players to beat up the faces. He saves Francine though.

Rating: C-. Not bad but whatever I guess. This was all about Shane getting one last thing and he did so good for them. Yeah the match sucked but it had great heat and it got the job done so I’ll give it credit.

We look at the TV Title match again as we’re rapidly running out of time. The referee says this isn’t Holyfield-Lewis fight and there will be a clean winner. He’s referring to Evander Holyfield vs. Lennox Lewis. They had a long fight and Lewis more or less dominated but the fight was declared a draw. Apparently the referee was ready to give Lynn the belt because he was the clear winner.

Even the interviewer more or less says that’s freaking stupid. Van Dam walks in and says there will be a rematch at the next PPV. Sure why not. So Lynn had the title won and was told he had the title but wanted five more minutes and got pinned clean. Sure why not?

ECW World Title/FTW Title: Sabu vs. Taz

This is title for title for no apparent reason. We see a clip of how Taz broke Sabu’s jaw. Apparently that same clothesline tore tendons in Taz’s arm. That’s quite an arm strike. Taz gets a nice pop. Why do they keep saying that this was the main event of Barely Legal? It wasn’t as far as I remember. Also, from ECW, I still have never heard WHY THEY HATE EACH OTHER.

Would that be so hard to freaking tell me? Yes I know why from other research, but you would think they could TELL ME THAT OR SOMETHING. It’s so strange thinking that Taz is such an imbecile on commentary now. Taz talks before the match again and says we should make it falls count anywhere and then says his catchphrase because we have to have that right.

We hear Sabu talk which is something you rarely hear if ever. I think other than on DVDs I’ve heard it once? They actually start with a wrestling sequence if you can believe that. We hit about our 20th F Bomb tonight. Sure why not. Sick boot to the head of Sabu. Here’s your required brawling for the main event as we hit the crowd. The beauty of crowd brawling for them at least is they get to go out and do very little at all but still make it look like they’re doing a lot.

Ok not really but you would think otherwise. We’re on the ramp now and that gets us nowhere. This is just spot after spot with little flow or thought to them at all. Hey we’re in the ring! What do you know about that? It’s table time of course and Sabu goes through it. Taz calls out Hogan and Flair. That’s just amusing. This is ALL Taz.

Fonzie tries to throw in the towel but Sabu says no. This is just Sabu getting beaten up, so therefore it’s becoming totally awesome! He makes a short comeback and Taz gets his foot on the ropes. So what if it’s FALLS COUNT ANYWHERE? Even the fans yell at that. And there’s the Tazmission and Sabu is out. Handshake ends the show.

Rating: D. Yeah this was pretty weak. It was just one guy beating the heck out of the other with one guy refusing to quit the entire time, then a short comeback and the ending is a guy that put on a stunt show not actually giving up because he’s out cold. Even after all that, I hope that Sabu and Taz Have A Nice Day If You Smell What I’m Cooking.

Overall Rating: D. This is more or less a one match show as Lynn and Van Dam had a good match but other than that, this felt thrown together and like it was about 1/3 filler. Not a lot made sense and they even screwed up the one good match they had with a stupid ending. I think the problem here is that you have no one legit to challenge Taz other than Van Dam and Heyman simply would not give him the push.

Awesome and Tanaka were both gone and Sid was too big of a deal to put against Taz I guess, so we get matches that aren’t that interesting like this which is ok but we’ve seen it SO many times that it’s just boring. The show is watchable I suppose, but I wanted it to end about an hour and a half before it did. If this was cut to about 2 hours instead of three, it’s FAR better. Check out the TV Title match if you want but it’s not required viewing.