ECW on Sci-Fi – November 14, 2006: That’s The Sixth Guy

ECW on Sci-Fi
Date: November 14, 2006
Location: Manchester Evening News Arena, Manchester, England
Attendance: 15,266
Commentators: Joey Styles, Elijah Burke

We’re in England with about three weeks to go until December to Dismember. Tonight’s main story is who will be debuting as the new star from either Raw or Smackdown to fill in the final spot in the Chamber. We had a good show last week so hopefuly ECW can keep up the roll that they’re on. Well that is if you consider one week a roll. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of Holly’s turn last week.

Tazz had knee surgery so Burke is filling in on commentary.

Here are Heyman and Big Show to the ring where there’s a table and chair set up. I’m guessing this is for the contract signing. Heyman says there’s good news and bad news. The bad news is that due to what happened last week, RVD isn’t here tonight. However, Big Show IS here, which you would think we would get given that he’s standing right there. On to Elimination Chamber, which is a controversial match for some reason. Heyman lists off the five guys in the match so far and asks if someone from Raw or Smackdown is coming in to fill in the last spot.

To the shock of no one, Hardcore Holly is shown walking through the back. Before he can get here though, Bobby Lashley from Smackdown destroys Holly and stares at the camera. Heyman and Show are panicked as Lashley (a very muscular and legit amateur wrestling champion) comes to the ring. Big Show goes to the aisle to stop him but Bobby spears him down and signs the contract.

Post break Big Show, Test and Holly ask why Heyman had the whole open contract. Heyman: “I wanted to make this look legit.” Big Show: “WHY? We run this whole place!” That’s a really good point actually. Heyman makes Lashley vs. Holly tonight and Big Show tries to tell Holly that it’s a good idea.

CM Punk vs. Mike Knox

This feud has to end soon. The fans seem to love Punk here as does Knox’s girlfriend Kelly Kelly. Knox pounds on him to start but Punk sends him to the floor. A baseball slide misses and Mike pounds Punk down, only to get kicked in the head. Knox falls down but lands on Kelly in the process. Mike doesn’t seem to mind though as he pounds CM down some more. Back inside now and Knox goes after the back with a suplex and a catapult.

Another shot to the back gets two as Kelly is back up. Punk tries a suplex but his back won’t hold up, allowing Knox to hook a Boston crab. We finally get a rope break so it’s off to a bow and arrow hold by Knox. Punk escapes a suplex and starts firing off his strikes but the running knee in the corner eats elbow. Well his jaw eats the elbow but you get the idea.

Punk knocks Knox to the floor and hits a suicide dive, drawing an ECW chant. The springboard clothesline gets a VERY clothesline two as does the knee/bulldog combination. Mike comes back again with a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker but Punk backflips out of a belly to back suplex. He fires off his rapid strikes and it’s Rock Bottom and Anaconda Vice for the tap out.

Rating: B. Where in the world did this come from? These two beat the tar out of each other and we got a very good match out of it. The back stuff was fine and it was good to see Knox stick with it throughout the entire match. Punk winning is the right move of course but if you can get a good match before the inevitable ending, that makes it all the better.

Here’s Matt Striker in the back who talks about various great phrases through history, the last of which is of course from the Revolutionary War. This leads to a video on the Elimination Chamber.

Punk welcomes Lashley to ECW but says he’s taking the ECW Title in the Chamber. More solid work from Punk here.

Here’s Daivari with something to say. He demands that he and Khali be welcomed to ECW. Oh ok he has a match.

Daivari vs. Tommy Dreamer

Khali stares Dreamer down to start but Daivari chop blocks Tommy before the bell. Dreamer doesn’t seem to mind and stomps Daivari down in the corner. A dropkick takes Dreamer’s knee out and the leg work continues. Daivari gets kicked into the barricade and misses a top rope cross body as Dreamer fights on one leg. A low elevation flapjack puts Daivari down but Khali crotches Dreamer against the post for the fast DQ.

Dreamer takes the Punjabi Plunge post match.

Bobby Lashley vs. Hardcore Holly

The match starts during a break and Big Show, Test and Heyman are at ringside. A delayed one armed suplex takes Holly down and he heads to the floor. Holly sends Bobby face first into the steps and we head back inside. A bulldog takes Lashley down and we hit the chinlock. Holly goes up but jumps into a boot which at least knocks him down. Bobby starts his comeback and hits Abyss’ Shock Treatment for two. Lashley goes up and gets crotched followed by a superplex from Holly for two. Hardcore goes up but jumps into a belly to belly suplex. There’s the running powerslam but Big Show pulls the referee for the DQ.

Rating: C-. Not much here and there was never any doubt that Lashley was going to win somehow. I don’t see why they didn’t just have Lashley get the pin here as Holly isn’t in the main event at the PPV so what’s there to protect? Either way, not a terrible debut in ECW for him but the lack of a pin is kind of lame.

Test, Big Show and Holly triple team Lashley until Van Dam, Sabu and Punk make the save. The show ends with Van Dam and Lashley standing tall. They stare at each other a lot as well.

Overall Rating: B. The opening match was really solid and we got a major plot development for the Chamber so how can this be anything but good? Once the Chamber is done we’ll really start to pick things up around here which is what will make the shows a lot more interesting. Good stuff here as ECW has one of their strongest shows yet.

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