I’m sure you’ve seen it on newsboards etc. This smells kayfabeish to me. It’s too convenient for my tastes.

Thoughts on this?

ECW on TNN
Date: September 10, 1999
Location: Lost Battalion Hall, New York City, New York
Attendance: 1000
Commentators: Joey Styles, Joel Gertner

Back with episode three as we keep getting closer to Anarchy Rulz. The Dudleys are officially gone so we move into a new era. Our main event tonight is RVD vs. Jerry Lynn for the TV Title which is considered the holy grail of feuds in ECW. The matches are good but I’ve never found them to be the masterpieces that people claim that they are. Anyway, let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of the ending of last week’s show where the titles changed hands.

Opening sequence.

House show ads during Rhyno’s entrance.

Rhyno vs. Super Crazy

Before the ECWites start complaining, yes I know that’s the WWE spelling of it and that’s how I spell it. Get over it. Speed vs. power here. Crazy moves as fast as he can but his springboard moonsault press is caught in a powerslam for two. Rhyno is brand new here. He misses a charge and Crazy hits a springboard missile dropkick and a leg lariat of the same kind of two.

Gertner keeps trying to order Mexican food. Out to the floor and Rhyno is knocked into the crowd. HUGE Asai moonsault takes Rhyno out. Back in the ring and Rhyno starts up the power offense. Crazy comes back with a tornado DDT for two. Selling and being on offense for an extended period weren’t things commonly done in ECW. A moonsault gets knees and another powerslam gets two. Crazy counters a powerbomb into a rana for the pin.

Rating: C-. Not a bad match here with Crazy moving around quite well. The ECW midcard was usually very solid and this was one of their better periods. That being said, I eventually got tired of Tajiri vs. Crazy which happened for months on end. Decent little match here, although the ending was pretty weak. To be fair, Rhyno was brand new at this point so he didn’t have his whole deal down yet.

Post match Rhyno teases turning on his manager but destroys Crazy instead.

Since Tanaka and Awesome are challenging Taz for the title at the PPV, here’s their match from Heat Wave 98, which I’m copying and pasting. I’m not sure if the full version is shown on the TV show but this is the full review of if.

Mike Awesome vs. Masato Tanaka

These two feuded for the better part of ever and Tanaka usually would win if you can believe that. Awesome was just a freak of nature to say the least. In a little known bit of trivia, Awesome is the step nephew of one Hulk Hogan. Awesome could do just about everything and jumped all over the ring like Rey Mysterio, but he was the size of Test or so. And there he goes with a huge dive over the top rope.

Tanaka gets a running start with a chair to nail Awesome in the freaking head. That looked painful. Basically all Tanaka can do is blast him with a chair. I’m not saying that’s all he’s capable of, but that that’s all he can get to work. A huge splash hits as this is rather physical. It’s not great but it’s far from bad as well. Tanaka takes a bunch of chair shots to the head but he Rises Up as the chair looks diseased.

The Awesome Bomb connects but Awesome wants to use a table instead. I hate those things. A chair shot from the top which should have killed Tanaka connects and still no cover. Tanaka escapes twice despite likely being legally dead and power bombs Awesome through the table.

I’ve officially lost this match now, as there comes a point where disbelief can’t be suspended anymore. The Roaring Elbow connects for the second time but only the first time that it was either noticed or that Awesome sold it. A tornado DDT on a chair ends it with Tanaka getting the pin.

Rating: C+. Well it was a good brawl but not much more. The amount of kickouts was just dumb near the end, as half of those bumps should have killed them. It certainly was exciting if nothing else though. The good thing is that the matches didn’t really get bad but they never really got better either. This was fun.

House show ads.

TV Title: Jerry Lynn vs. Rob Van Dam

Jerry doesn’t even get an entrance. Van Dam is champion and has been for the better part of ever, which is about accurate I believe. They slug it out to start and we get a pretty sweet gymnastics routine until a standoff. They both pose but as Rob does, Lynn kicks him to the floor. Lynn hits a HUGE dive to the floor to take Rob out and we take a break. Back with Lynn being thrown into the barricade but RVD misses the Van Daminator because Lynn comes up with the brilliant idea of throwing the chair back.

Rob hits a moonsault off the barricade to take Lynn out. Joel: “That piece of commentary brought to you by the master of the obvious.” THANK YOU! That’s what gets on my nerves about Styles: he spends so much time saying the moves we’re seeing. This isn’t radio. I know what a moonsault looks like. Back in and Van Dam drops a legdrop onto a chair onto Lynn’s face.

Van Dam comes in with his top rope kick to take Lynn down for a close two. Fonzie throws in a chair and Rob loads up Jerry for a superplex onto said chair but Jerry counters into a sunset bomb onto it for two. They do a pretty nice sequence with the chair with both guys trying to hit the other with it, ending with Van Dam dropkicking it into Lynn’s head. Van Dam’s monkey flip is countered and Jerry hits a Van Daminator of his own for two.

Lynn hits a tornado DDT onto the chair and both guys are down. A delayed cover gets two for Lynn and the chair is thrown to the side. Lynn loads up the cradle piledriver but RVD counters into a pretty good pinfall reversal sequence. That gets a standing ovation and they clothesline each other….and the Impact Players run in for the no contest.

Rating: B-. Good match here but the chair got a little annoying. That’s part of my problem with ECW in general: I get that it’s a hardcore based company, but I’d like to see some more wrestling before we get to something like that. Good match though, and it’s clear why they couldn’t give us an ending here, which is ok.

The Impact Players (Justin Credible/Lance Storm with Jason and the smoking hot Dawn Marie) say they’re more deserving to close the show than these two.

We get a highlight package of the Impact Players’ greatest hits.

Lynn vs. RVD is made again for next week and a winner is guaranteed.

House show ads end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. Another pretty decent show here. The major perk of these shows is that they’re really short, running about 45 minutes and a good deal of that is taken up by house show ads and stuff that goes by really quickly. The show was entertaining enough though so I can see why people were fans of it. Decent show.

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ECW on TNN
Date: September 3, 1999
Location: Lost Battalion Hall, New York City, New York
Attendance: 1000
Commentators: Joey Styles, Joel Gertner

This is the second episode and I honestly have no idea what’s going on at the moment. Apparently we’re coming up on Anarchy Rulz which for some reason had the main event of RVD vs. Balls Mahoney but I don’t think that was advertised before the show. You’ll hear that a lot in these reviews: the matches aren’t really planned. Let’s get to it.

ECW World Title: Taz vs. Yoshihiro Tajiri

Taz is world champion but would be gone very soon. He would be in the WWF in January. Tajiri has Corino and Victory with him in his corner. You can barely understand the announcer. I think this is non-title. Taz pounds on him to start but walks into the handspring elbow.

Tajiri kicks him in the head and this is for the title. Ok then. Tajiri tries the Tarantula but gets countered into what we would call the Alabama Slam. Head and arms Tazplex and Taz spits in Tajiri’s face. They slug it out and Taz hooks a capture Tazplex to kill Tajiri. Taz hits the crossface shots but gets kicked in the head for two. Tajiri tries a big kick but Taz ducks and the Tazmission ends this quick.

Rating: C-. Nothing great here but the crowd LOVED Taz. That being said, he would lose the title at the PPV to Mike Awesome and would say goodbye to ECW. That’s not good because the Dudleys would be leaving really soon also. Tajiri is a guy I’ve been liking more and more lately as those kicks were SWEET.

Theme song after the opening match which is something that was a trend of theirs.

Joey is in the ring to open the show. There’s a TNN chant to start which sounds like they’re saying TNA. Now they chant NYC. Joel Gertner comes out and declares himself the new cohost. His nickname tonight: Joel “I’m like the Rubik’s Cube: the more you play with me, the harder I get” Gertner. Those were always hilarious.

They bring out Jerry Lynn who says that they’re better than Raw and Nitro. Therefore, he should bring them the best match they can. He calls out RVD for a TV Title shot RIGHT NOW. Fonzie, RVD’s manager, comes out and says no. Lynn goes after Fonzie so RVD comes out for the brawl.

Anarchy Rulz ad.

Someone has jumped from WCW to ECW. Find out who it was on the hotline! Or wait another 30 minutes because they show up at the end of the show!

Here are the Dudleyz who are here for their last night in the company. Before they can talk though we go to the announcers and are told next week it’s RVD vs. Lynn.

House show ads.

ECW Tag Titles: Dudley Boys vs. Spike Dudley/Balls Mahoney

The Dudleys, on their last night in the promotion remember, are challenging here. Why would Heyman give them a shot if he knew they were jumping ship? No wonder they’re not in business anymore. This is joined in progress after a break. The champs take over and clear the ring. Balls throws Spike over the top onto the Dudleys in a cool spot. Back in and Spike walks into a Bubba Bomb to take him down.

Now let’s stop watching the match and see a replay of what we just saw. Spike is dropped over the barricade and is busted open. The Dudleys have threatened to win the titles and give them to the McMahons on Raw. Bubba sets for the back splash off the middle rope but Spike punches him in the balls. Bubba responds by superbombing him off the middle rope as we take a break.

Back with the champions hitting their finishers at the same time for two each. D-Von hits a reverse DDT on Balls while Spike is thrown over the top and through a table. Balls comes back with chair shots for both guys. He brings in a table and covers it in tacks which isn’t going to end well for him. According to the first law of wrestling, Balls goes through the table that he set up. They botch the ending as Spike misses the save he’s supposed to make so the referee counts three but goes to count four. 3D to Spike gives them the titles a second later anyway.

Rating: D+. Match was a mess but the whole point of it is that th company has no idea what to do now because they’ve lost the titles and the Dudleys are headed out the door with them. Spike teamed with a lot of random people to fight his brothers and Balls was just another in the line of them.

More house show ads.

Rob Zombie likes ECW so we get a music video of his with ECW clips in it. This eats up like three minutes.

The Impact Players pose. Ok then. That’s Justin Credible and Lance Storm.

Rollerjam ad. I LOVED that show for some reason.

The Dudleys are here again and after the hotline is plugged again, they say that here, boys become men and men become heroes. In the WWF, heroes become legends. Great line from Bubba: “If God was a heel, he’d be the Dudley Boys.” He calls Stamford, Connecticut the true hot bed of hardcore wrestling. However, before they go there’s one more thing they need to do.

They say they’re going to ruin the company by taking out the heart and soul of the company. The fans chant for Sandman and the Dudleys say they’ll give him 3D if he comes out. Instead they tell Dreamer to come out if he cares about this company at all. Dreamer has a very bad back at this point. Dreamer comes out but Heyman is stopping him from getting into the ring. Francine comes out and Bubba calls her a $2 w****. Joel: “Joey can I borrow $1.87?”

This is all being done over clips of the Dudleys and Dreamer’s highlights. The Dudleys talk about the time they broke Dreamer’s wife’s neck which was the story they used when Beaulah wanted to get out of wrestling. Bubba says the Dudleys used to come into her hospital room and double team her. Dreamer still won’t come to the ring as the Dudleys taunt him. He finally snaps and it’s on. Since it’s ECW, we get a ref and a bell and the titles are on the line.

Tag Titles: Tommy Dreamer vs. Dudley Boys

Dreamer takes them down with a double Russian legsweep for two. Tommy finds some salad tongs and grabs D-Von’s balls. Francine throws in a ladder which Tommy tettertotters into the Dudley’s faces. Francine hits Sign Guy in the head with something to take him down. Bubba gets thrown into the ladder and D-Von gets thrown into Bubba, resulting in the falling headbutt ball shot to D-Von.

Bubba gets up and sends Dreamer into the ladder which kills him because of his back. The Dudleys destroy Tommy with belt shots and loads up 3D but Dreamer counters with a DDT. Cue the returning RAVEN who kills Bubba with the Even Flow and pins him to win the titles with Dreamer, his mortal enemy.

Rating: C. This is a really hard one to grade because all that mattered were the last 10 seconds of the match. A lot of it was Dreamer out cold while the Dudleys beat on him so it barely qualifies as a match. Anyway, this was the big return mentioned earlier and Raven got an eruption after finally returning from WCW. At WCW, there had been a meeting where Bischoff told the roster that if anyone wanted out to get up and leave now. Raven was the only one that walked out and he was in ECW in a week.

Raven celebrates in the crowd while Dreamer is stunned to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. This show has a VERY different grading scale than the rest of the shows I do. For one thing, they had no idea what they were doing yet and their top champions were leaving in the span of two weeks. What exactly were they supposed to do in that situation? Anyway, this was about getting the Dudleys out with a bang and they certainly did that. Fun show, but they had a lot to learn, and to be fair the show got a lot better structured soon.

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There are a total of 59 episodes of this show so why not knock them out too? I’ll be doing two of these right after I do the ECW on Sci-Fi episodes so this won’t take long to knock out. I just hope I can find them all. Enjoy.

First ECW on TNN
Date: August 27, 1999
Commentator: Joey Styles

From the title I think you get the idea here. This show is weird as it’s a lot like the old WWF TV shows as it’s a collection of previously aired matches thrown together here. The first show they taped was awful so they turned it into this. The main thing is Lynn vs. Van Dam from Hardcore Heaven 99 which I’ll re-review and see how it matches up with the original rating I gave it, which is something I don’t think I’ve done before. Let’s get to it.

We open with a clip of the Dudleys (who would leave for WWF in like a week) powerbombing someone through a flaming table as Joey says this isn’t WCW or WWF but ECW.

Cue theme song. The main focus is Tazz who would leave in like 2-3 months and everyone knew that was going to happen.

Joey lists off a bunch of people to have held the TV Title but says RVD might be better than all of them.

TV Title: Rob Van Dam vs. Jerry Lynn

I think this is new commentary here but I’m not sure. This is really just a way to introduce Van Dam and give us what they know is an exciting match. You can’t hear a word the ring announcer is saying. They start with a nice sequence where neither can get any real advantage but the fans love it. We actually get highlights of both guys in the middle of the match. I get that you want to showcase two of your top guys but dude, do it when there’s not a match on.

Van Dam gets knocked to the floor and Lynn takes over. Lynn gets a top rope bulldog for two. RVD is bleeding from…..something. I think at this point we go to a commercial as we get an ad for Anarchy Rulz. Joey suggests the Warrior could be coming to ECW. Oh dear. Yeah the commentary here is new. Lynn is bleeding too now after botching a fall to the floor and hitting his foot on the ropes. The replay has a rap song with it. Really?

Lynn gets a sunset powerbomb for two. What would an ECW match be without tables? Van Dam’s eye is messed up and black as coal. Van Daminator in the stands as this match is kind of hard to follow. Another commercial doesn’t help as they don’t stop the match for it, which is either a good idea or a bad idea and I’m not sure which. Lynn gets another sunset powerbomb through the table on the floor.

CUE THE RAP SONG REPLAY! After a clip or a commercial, Fonzie takes a chair pelted at his head. Lynn goes for a top rope belly to belly but he just falls off. You know the chant we get from that. Cradle Piledriver is blocked and both guys are down. Split Legged Moonsault hits Lynn. PAY ATTENTION MORRISON. THAT IS HOW YOU DO THE MOVE. And there’s the Five Star out of more or less nowhere but Lynn rolls through for two. Van Daminator and a HUGE Five Star ends it.

Rating: B-. The clipping hurts this a lot. It makes this look like far less of an ultra competitive match and more like RVD just breaking a sweat. It’s still good but at the same time it really makes Lynn look weak. At the same time though this was about RVD and that worked very well. This was still good but a different kind of good. I gave the PPV version a B as I still find these matches to be overrated by most ECW fans.

We plug Rollerjam (which as a kid I thought was a cool show. The women were hot if nothing else) and then talk about the ECW World Title, listing off guys that didn’t win it but tried to, such as Konnan, Benoit, Austin and Foley. I’m not entirely sold on talking about guys that USED to be here, but you could look at it like this: We had these guys before they were superstars. Imagine what kind of buried treasures we have here now. That makes sense.

Shane threw down the NWA Title, which meant nothing to most fans watching this show but whatever. That was 5 years before the debut of the TV show. Didn’t know that.

ECW World Title: Taz vs. Rhyno

This is from Hardcore TV or a house show. Rhyno hits a powerbomb 3 seconds in and Taz just pops up. Rhyno means nothing at this point which you can probably guess. Well we’re in Chicago if nothing else. Taz is massacring him here with Rhyno looking like a freaking jobber. He’s hit two punches to the ribs and a no sold powerbomb. Tazz sets up a table and Rhyno hits new levels of offense with THREE punches to the ribs. Suplex through the table sets up the Tazmission. Total squash if there ever has been one.

Rating: N/A. This was DOMINANCE which is the idea I guess, but Rhyno looks like a joke here. The problem is that these matches are just random defenses with no meaning to them. We keep hearing about Steve Corino and how he’s Taz’s archenemy, but we never even see him.

Video on Sabu who is apparently awesome. No match or anything but just highlights.

Ad for Anarchy Rulz again.

Spike Dudley vs. Big Sal

Low blow and Acid Drop end it. Literally that’s the whole thing. Who is Spike? Who is Sal? “Spike has done it again!” What does he do? Apparently that’s not important. Ah ok they call him the Giant Killer.

The Impact Players introduce themselves and we have no idea if they mean anything or not. Cyrus pops up for no apparent reason as Jason makes gay jokes about Joey. We see clips of the Impact Players beating people up which helps a bit as we know they’re dominant.

House show ads.

We get a BUNCH of clips of guys and a brief description (as in their nickname) of them. It’s set to a Kid Rock song so what do you expect here?

Taz talks about how TNN and ECW are together now and how cool that is I guess. We get clips of famous people he’s made tap out. He talks for like three minutes and that ends this mess.

Overall Rating: D. This was a total mess. Considering this is the first show, this was just awful as you learn nothing about the guys other than Taz being a tough guy and RVD is awesome. Other than that though you get nothing at all here though and other than a single good match to start, this gave us nothing. We have no idea about any feuds or angles or anything like that as it was just a few squashes and one big match from months earlier. This just didn’t work as Heyman clearly didn’t know what he was doing, which became a theme here. Bad show and just a car wreck of an hour.

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ECW on Sci-Fi
Date: June 27, 2006
Location: Roanoke Civic Center, Roanoke, Virginia
Commentators: Joey Styles, Tazz

We’re back with the third episode here and the main event here is Angle vs. RVD in what’s probably going to get a majority of this show. Vengeance has passed and RVD is still world champion. Something major would happen between the end of tonight’s show and the beginning of next week’s though, but we’ll get to that later. Let’s get to it.

We immediately begin with a match.

Roadkill vs. Sabu

Roadkill is a big Amish guy known as the Angry Amish Chicken Plucker. This is Extreme Rules. Sabu tries a very quick camel clutch but Roadkill gets to the rope before it’s on. Jumping DDT takes Roadkill down and it’s chair time. He loads up the Triple Jump Moonsault but Roadkill slams Sabu’s head into the chair. Neckbreaker gets two. Roadkill goes for a table but Sabu uses the chair as a springboard to dive over the top to take Roadkill down, landing on his head in the process.

Bossman Slam and a Vader Bomb Elbow get two for Roadie. Sabu is put on the table but Roadie goes up, allowing Sabu to pelt the chair at Roadkill’s balls. Top rope rana gets two. Now he pelts the chair at Roadkill’s head and the Arabian Facebuster puts Roadie through the table. Camel Clutch looks to finish but Sabu hits him with a chair a few more times first, then finishes with the Clutch.

Rating: C+. At the end of the day, this is what ECW is all about so having at least some of this on each show was a requirement at the beginning. Also having ECW guys on the show was a good idea as they were at least looking like ECW before they changed everything up and made it into WWE 3.

Kevin Thorn is still outside.

Here’s Dreamer who calls out Big Show to give him another beating. Seriously, he thanks Show for the beating and asks for another, ala the cane shots from Sandman WAY back in the day. Just like last week, it’s not a match but rather just a beating by Big Show. I’m not sure what else to say about this.

Mike Knox (not yet named) looks at Kelly’s chest and says it’s only for him. She’ll be in his corner tonight.

Angle says that he hates himself for not being champion. If he wins tonight, he gets a title shot at SNME. Failure is not an option when your name is Kurt Angle.

Danny Doring vs. Mike Knox

Doring fires off some right hands but Knox hits a Sky High for two. Some fan calls Kelly over to strip for him so Knox kills him. He sends Kelly to the back, kicks Doring’s head off and gets the pin with a spinning Downward Spiral. Total squash.

Test is still coming.

We recap what we saw 90 seconds ago with Knox and the fan.

Kelly dances to the same song from last week and Knox stops her from revealing too much. Ok then. This takes like three minutes. When you have an hour long show, that’s WAY too long.

Here’s Big Dick Johnson as Fat Ugly Male Stripper to get beaten up by Sandman. It’s nonsense like this that made people hate this show.

Heyman explains triple threats to RVD. If Angle wins tonight, it’s a fatal fourway at SNME. RVD says it’s ok because he’s been smoking lately. He meant that literally I think.

Edge and Lita show up and throw out some fans.

After a break, Tazz talks to Edge who says he’ll win the title because he’s the Whole F’N Show. That triple threat would be moved to Raw I believe.

Kurt Angle vs. Rob Van Dam

This is non-title. Angle takes him to the mat almost immediately and the fans sound like they want Cena. They slug it out in the corner and Rob hits his rolling monkey flip. Rob grabs a front facelock and off to the windmill kick. He goes up top but Kurt shoves him off the top and into the barricade as we take a break. Back with Kurt holding a chinlock. Off to a body scissors as this has been all Kurt since the break.

Rob fights up but Kurt snaps off a German and it’s back to the chinlock. Van Dam fights out again and hits a spinwheel kick off the ropes to put both guys down. A springboard kick takes Kurt down but Kurt immediately grabs his legs and drives Rob into the corner. A big suplex counters a kick and gets two. Angle Slam is countered but Kurt rolls through into a failed ankle lock attempt.

Another German hits but is the release version this time. Now it’s the ankle lock but Rob rolls through very quickly and superkicks Kurt down for a delayed two. The top rope kick is caught in the ankle lock but he makes the rope and throws Kurt to the floor. Back in a slingshot legdrop gets two. Small package gets two for Kurt. Rob kicks him down but misses Rolling Thunder and the ankle lock is attempted again. Van Dam kicks him off and hits the Split Legged Moonsault for two. Rob kicks him down and goes up but gets suplexed down for two. Slam is countered by a tornado DDT and the Five Star gets the clean pin.

Rating: B. My goodness it was a clean pin. That’s something you never see in a big match anymore so it was a nice thing to see here. Putting Rob over the big deal that came to ECW is a good thing, as it says that while Angle is the new monster, RVD is still the champion. Good match with Van Dam using the one weapon he had that worked until he could splash him for the pin.

Edge spears Rob to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. So let’s see: Sabu squash, Kelly dances and gets covered up, Sandman beats up a comedy character, WWE guys end the show. This sounds very familiar and that’s not a good sign. However next week everything would change as Rob and Sabu would get arrested for drug possession and Van Dam would drop both titles. Also a new guy would debut that I think you might have heard of.

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Rock was a big deal, but should he have been here?Rock wasn’t quite a superstar yet but he was almost there.  That being said, should Vince, Austin’s archnemesis, have been in the main event against him?  Assume that match doesn’t happen at St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, should Vince vs. Austin have been the main event here?

I think there’s a very good case to be made for it.  This was without a doubt the feud for the company at this point and I think you could make a very solid argument to put them out there.  Vince could have decent matches when he wanted to and I don’t think you could argue that there wasn’t anything bigger as far as feuds go.

Should it have been Vince vs. Austin for the title?

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Victory Road 2012
Date: March 17, 2012
Location: Impact Zone, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tazz

Welcome to the latest TNA filler PPV, Victory Road. That’s what’s plagued this show’s build: nothing on it is going to mean anything after tonight. It’s just a stop on the way to Lockdown, which has a few benefits actually. First of all, there aren’t any expectations for this show because none of it really matters. Second, sometimes it’s ok to not have a major main event every time as it makes the bigger main events seem more important. This has some potential to be good so let’s get to it.

We open with clips from last week’s Impact of Roode telling Sting that the business has passed him by and then Sting snapping.

Tenay and Taz talk about the show a bit and tell everyone to talk to them on Twitter. How about they just call the show instead?

Here’s Ray to open the show. He had said online that he was going to hold the show hostage. The idiot fans start a We Want D-Von chant. Ray says he’s trending worldwide because he’s taking this show over. The show isn’t continuing unless his match with Storm is a #1 contender match. Send referees, send security, send the police, he doesn’t care. Instead here’s Storm to say Ray has chicken legs. Storm says the #1 contendership is up for grabs RIGHT NOW.

James Storm vs. Bully Ray

So what was the point in having Ray come out there and talk for five minutes? The fans chant chicken legs and Ray beats Storm down into the corner. He goes for the beer, has a drink and walks into the Last Call for the pin at 1:08. Storm had legit ankle surgery this week which I’d bet is why the match wasn’t even a match. Storm only hit one move the entire time.

Aries answers Twitter questions. A fan wants to know when he’ll get to main event a show. Eric Bischoff comes in and tells JB to leave. JB: “Do you have any authority around here anymore?” Eric: “I can take you out so get out of here.” Is this tied into those comments Bischoff made on Twitter this week? Nothing of note is said here other than Aries is the main event no matter when he’s on the show.

Austin Aries vs. Zema Ion

Aries is the longest reigning champion in history and Ion won a match by DQ on Impact recently. James Storm is trending worldwide on Twitter. Geez you can’t escape it in any wrestling company anymore. The fans seem split so they start with a gymnastics routine resulting in Aries stealing the hairspray and laying on the top rope ala Shawn. Brainbuster is escaped and Ion is knocked to the floor off the top.

The suicide dive takes Ion down so Aries grabs a phone and tweets. Oh give me a break. Dropkick to the back gets two for the champ. Ion gets knocked to the apron and manages to guillotine Aries and take over. Tazz reads the tweet from Aries because that’s what you watch wrestling for: Twitter updates. Ion hits a corkscrew crossbody off the middle rope for two.

Zema pounds on him for awhile and tries Aries’ pendulum elbow with no success. Aries comes back with an atomic drop and pounds him into the corner. Ion loads the hairspray into his tights but is knocked down by a spinning forearm smash. Aries hits a knee crusher into a belly to belly followed by the pendulum elbow for two.

Ion gets knocked into the corner and does the old switch move of grabbing the title but as the referee takes it out, he pulls out the hairspray which goes into Aries’ eyes for two. Ion tries a superplex but Aries counters into a sunset bomb to put both guys down. Aries is still mostly blind. Not that it matters as he hits the brainbuster and rolls into the Last Chancery for the tap out at 11:04.

Rating: B-. Aries is a de facto face now due to pure crowd support but it’s going to be interesting to see what they do with him. He’s outgrown the X Division which is why the weight limit addition has been a bad thing for it. He’s going to have to move up soon though because there’s no point to him fighting these low level X guys anymore.

Tazz reads another tweet.

The Motorcity Machineguns are coming back soon.

We recap the tag title feud. The idea here is that Morgan and Crimson are champions but they started arguing over who should get the win and it resulted in them losing the titles. They won the right to a rematch here tonight and they’ve promised to put their differences aside.

Tag Titles: Samoa Joe/Magnus vs. Crimson/Matt Morgan

After TNA’s Powerpoint about the match we’re ready to go. Joe’s has a mowhawk now. Morgan and Crimson almost get into a fight over who should start. TWITTER UPDATE: Austin Aries is trending. Crimson and Magnus start and Magnus takes him down with a clothesline. Off to Joe to a big pop and he pounds Crimson down before quickly tagging Magnus back in.

Crimson goes to the corner but won’t tag. Instead he goes to the floor to get a breath and comes back in with a snapmare and clothesline. Off to a chinlock with Magnus in trouble. The idea here is that Crimson wants to do everything himself because he doesn’t need Morgan’s help. The fans chant that they want Morgan. Keep in mind that they wanted D-Von earlier so how much can they be trusted?

Spinebuster plants Magnus for two. Crimson hooks his cravate but Magnus fights out of it. He beats Crimson down well enough to make the tag but Crimson still won’t tag out. Joe snaps off punches so Crimson goes up and dives at Joe, who does the always cool step aside. Joe sends him to the corner and Morgan shoves Crimson out of the way and tags himself in. Morgan cleans house but Crimson tags himself back in after about thirty seconds.

Morgan tags himself back in and Crimson walks out. The champs destroy Morgan with double team combos (including a big boot that missed by about 9 inches to the left). Crimson says he’s the winner of this team so Morgan tries to fight alone. He manages to take the champs down but Crimson spears Morgan, allowing the champions to hit their finisher, resulting in the pin by Magnus at 10:12.

Rating: C. The match was a backdrop for an angle more than anything else which is ok. Crimson turning heel was something they almost had to do because his run could only go so long without focusing more on the winning streak. There isn’t much to say about the match but it wasn’t bad or anything.

During the replays we hear more Tweets.

JB apologizes for the Bischoff incident from earlier and asks Roode a question from Twitter about his main events at tonight’s show and then Lockdown. Sting’s career ends tonight and then at Lockdown….we’re not sure what’s going to happen because Storm pops up. He doesn’t want a match. He wants a fight and he wants it right now.

Taz and Tenay debate hashtags. Seriously, that’s what we’ve gotten to tonight.

TV Title: Robbie E vs. ???

This is another open challenge because we don’t have time to get the TV Title on TV since Garrett Bischoff needs to get his five minutes every week. Robbie says that there’s no open challenge tonight because everyone is afraid of him. The fans want RVD. Oh apparently the invitational is going to happen tonight but now fans can take him up on it. They go around the ring and Robbie makes fun of fans, including three overweight women. He asks Val, but says they’ll be “wrestling” later. Big Rob says she’s not on the list. This goes on forever. The open challenge is officially canceled so they’re going to pose instead. We have a challenger.

TV Title: Robbie E vs. D-Von

Yes, this is what’s on PPV. He comes through the crowd for some reason. Robbie backs off so Brian Hebner says we’re doing this. D-Von is in street clothes. There’s another Tweet. One man flapjack puts Robbie down and a clothesline puts him on the floor. Matt Morgan is trending. Robbie tries to get a chair but BROOKE HOGAN stops him. I kid you not, she’s in the front row and grabbed the chair from him. Back in and D-Von runs him over with clotheslines and shoulder blocks. A splash in the corner sets up a clothesline for two. A spinebuster gives D-Von the title at 3:02. Just retire the title. Now.

Rating: F. D-Von Dudley is a singles champion. Never mind that it’s 2012. D-Von freaking Dudley is a singles champion. That doesn’t need any more explanation. Oh and Brooke Hogan was involved in this. They did fire Russo didn’t they? I mean….D-VON JUST WON A TITLE. With the roster they have, they pick him? Who thinks that’s a good idea?

Dixie says Slammiversary is going to be in Dallas/Fort Worth. She’ll be ringside for the main event tonight.

We recap Gail vs. Madison. They were friends, then they started fighting, then Madison snuck into a battle royal to become #1 contender, then they lost the tag titles and here’s the match.

Knockouts Title: Madison Rayne vs. Gail Kim

Madison’s looking good as always. D-Von is the #1 trend worldwide. It’s true: 2012 is the apocalypse. Very slow match to start with Madison in control. She chokes in the corner as Taz reads tweets. Gail takes the knee out but Madison pops up so they can slug it out. Gail hits a middle rope cross body and a missile dropkick for two each. This is going nowhere. Gail tries to use the tights but gets two. Taz misreads a Twitter handle and Tenay cracks up. It wasn’t funny but then again Twitter handles shouldn’t be read here. Eat Defeat is avoided but the second attempt works at 7:07. I can’t believe I had that little to say in seven minutes.

Rating: D. This was nothing. Madison looked good but that’s about it. This show has been pretty awful so far as the constant Twitter references are really taking me out of the show. This is worse than even WWE with that stuff. The match had no heat at all, probably because everyone was in shock at the previous match.

It’s 9:22 and we have three matches left.

JB is with Daniels and Kaz and asks something he heard about on Twitter recently: why has his attitude changed? Before he can answer, Daniels says he runs the show here. In a nice bit of continuity, Daniels has tape under his eye from the cut Anderson gave him “last week”.

We recap AJ/Anderson vs. Daniels/Kaz. In chapter 19874 of Daniels vs. AJ, Kaz has apparently been coerced or brainwashed into going against AJ. Daniels thinks maybe the problem is with AJ instead of everyone else. Styles says he’s not going to associate with friends anymore, so he brought in Anderson to help him.

Christopher Daniels/Kazarian vs. Mr. Anderson/AJ Styles

As is the custom, we update Twitter before we get the match going. Anderson and Kaz start Anderson throws him around the ring and it’s off to AJ quickly. Daniels comes in to meet him and they fight over a headlock. They run each other over and AJ hooks an armdrag to grab an armbar. Dixie Carter is in the front row with the host of some Spike show called Repo Games. He’ll be at Impact also. Ten points if they bring in Barry Darsow for a showdown.

Anderson and AJ pinball Daniels back and forth with right hands. Everything breaks down and Kaz and Daniels are thrown into each other. Anderson drops elbows on Daniels and it’s AJ vs. Daniels once things calm down. AJ hits a spinning delayed vertical suplex for two. Back to Anderson but Daniels gets in a knee so he can tag. Kaz gets thrown down quickly and Styles comes back in. The tags are very fast.

An elbow puts AJ onto the floor and Daniels takes over. Daniels hooks an abdominal stretch and AJ is in trouble. A boot to the face keeps him down, so LET’S READ TWEETS! This is ridiculous. The show is already bad but this is making it unbearable. Daniels stays on the ribs but when he and Kaz try to double team, AJ manages to clothesline Daniels and Pele Kaz to put them both down. Hot tag to Anderson who cleans house. Mic Check to Kaz is broken up and Daniels hits an STO to take him down. Springboard clothesline takes Kaz down and everything breaks down.

In a SWEET counter, AJ tries the moonsault into the DDT but Daniels drops to his back and puts his feet in the air so that AJ slams his face into them. Daniels and Anderson go to the floor after AJ makes a blind tag. AJ tries a springboard sunset flip but Kaz counters into the Fade to Black, but AJ rolls through into the Styles Clash for the pin at 13:58.

Rating: C+. The decent match made the show better, but this show has really taken its toll on me. AJ vs. Daniels is a feud that I’m tired of. They’ve feuded literally for years on and off and AJ always comes out on top, which makes things pretty boring at the end of the day. Pretty good match though.

Angle is in the back and says hi to his son. Usually he doesn’t let him watch violence, but Angle wants his son Cody to see his son hero get destroyed. He talks about the things he’s going to do to Jeff with a sick happiness in his voice. Tonight, Jeff gets an Extreme Makeover. See, this was what you call a promo. No Twitter questions were needed, and it actually got me thinking about the match. Why is that the first one of these tonight?

We recap Angle vs. Hardy. Angle cost him the world title because his son likes Jeff Hardy too much so he’s going to beat Hardy up for it.

Jeff Hardy vs. Kurt Angle

Hardy goes around the ring to shake hands and hug fans, including hugging Brooke. The fans are somewhat split but Hardy is getting louder chants. Their match a year and a half ago at No Surrender was awesome so maybe this can be good too. Feeling out process to start and Kurt bails to the floor. With that, this is officially longer than Jeff’s Victory Road match last year. Back inside and Jeff runs him out again. They have a lot of time left in the show so they’re probably stalling a bit.

Back in and Kurt takes it to the mat with a chinlock. Jeff counters so Kurt elbows him in the face. Kurt takes a knee to the gut and seemed to land awkwardly. He seems ok though. Hardy comes out of the corner with a headscissors to send Kurt to the outside. Hardy controls out there but back inside Kurt pounds him down in the corner. Twitter stuff. Hardy comes back with the legdrop between the legs and a dropkick for two.

Out to the floor again and Hardy rams Kurt’s head into a chair. Kurt tries to ram him into the steps but Hardy reverses and it’s Kurt that crashes. Jeff sets up the steps for Poetry in Motion but crashes into the barricade. And they wonder why he’s addicted to painkillers. Jeff’s tailbone hit the barricade and Kurt goes after him. He gets two inside and hits a suplex for two. Off to a rear chinlock.

Jeff fights up but walks into a belly to belly to put him right back down. Hardy gets his feet up in the corner and a clothesline to put Kurt down. They get back up and Jeff throws punches to set up the Whisper in the Wind for two. Twist of Fate is countered into Rolling Germans, four in this case. Angle Slam is countered into the Twisting Stunner but Angle runs the corner to counter the Swanton with the belly to belly.

Kurt hooks the ankle lock but Jeff kicks off after a few seconds. Angle misses a charge and hits the post and a Twist of Fate gets two. Angle rolls to the outside and Hardy rams his head into the steps a few times. There goes the shirt and he loads up the Swanton but Kurt gets the knees up. Angle Slam gets two. Kurt has a cut over his left eye. He chokes Jeff with one of the sleeves that Hardy wears but another Slam is countered into Twist #3. Both guys are down. Back up and the mule kick puts Kurt down. Swanton hits but Jeff covers sloppily, allowing Kurt to roll him up and grab the rope for the pin (Jeff’s shoulder was up) at 19:45.

Rating: B. I’ve said this a lot of times but it’s still true: a lot of the time, the solution to your problems is to have a good wrestling match. This started slow but they got into Kurt’s formula which is guaranteed to be at least good. The ending sets up a rematch, likely as captains of the Lethal Lockdown teams next month. Match of the night by far.

We recap the show to fill in more time.

Roode vs. Sting is now falls count anywhere, no DQ.

Jeremy gives us a long Twitter update and asks Sting a question. He says he’s tired of Facebooking and Tweeting so it’s time to wrestle.

We recap the main event, which is Sting tormenting Roode, which Roode says is because Sting is jealous of Roode.

Sting vs. Bobby Roode

Non-title and no holds barred. After some big match intros we’re ready to go. This is just no holds barred, despite them saying falls count anywhere earlier. Do those go together now? Sting starts off fast and beats the champion down pretty easily. He hits a lot of clotheslines and knocks Roode to the floor. They fight up the ramp (which means Sting beats the tar out of him) and then back to ringside to send Roode into the steps.

The fans chant “over here” so Sting beats him up wherever chants the loudest. Roode manages to send him into the post but Sting counters a chair shot. Roode goes into the barricade and Sting knocks him into the crowd. Back to ringside and Sting takes a thumb to the eye. The champ rams Sting’s leg into the post and Sting is in trouble. Roode stays on the knee for a few minutes while Taz reads a Tweet from an 85 year old grandmother.

It’s figure four time but Sting rolls over after about a minute. Roode continues to channel his inner Flair and chops at Sting, which just like Flair’s, don’t work at all on him. Now Sting goes after the knees and after a superplex, it’s Scorpion time. Roode makes the rope and comes back with a spear for two. The champ brings in a chair and sets for either a powerbomb or piledriver but Sting backdrops him to the apron. Sting tries a Death Drop onto the chair but he rams his own head into the chair. Roode wakes up and covers for the pin at 16:50.

Rating: C+. The ending brought this down a bit. Sting matches have a really bad habit of ending out of nowhere. This also really doesn’t help Roode because Roode lucks out again. Roode needed to go over strong here but instead he looks like he got lucky to win the match over a part time wrestler. That’s not good, again. Has he won a major match on his own merits since he’s been champion? Sting is great in this role as part time wrestler and as a special attraction as he can still do well enough out there.

Post match it’s time for the big evil angle. Roode gets the chair and yells at Dixie, then pulls her over the railing and into the ring. Sting makes the save but once he turns to check on Dixie, Roode hits him with the chair. Roode gets some duck tape and ties Sting to the bottom ropes. He goes to hit Sting with the chair but Dixie is untying him. Roode gets in her face and yells at her, rubbing her face for some reason. He yells at her…and that’s it. He doesn’t hit her, he doesn’t shove her, nothing. This would have been more effective, except NO ONE CARES ABOUT DIXIE CARTER!

Overall Rating: D+. The last 50 minutes of the show brought it up A LOT, but earlier on the show was absolutely dreadful. The in ring work earlier was ok to bad, but the point of this show was the Twitter. They went WAY too far with that nonsense where even the wrestlers weren’t answering the questions. It got stupid and was really taking away from the show, which was just ok anyway. On top of that, we had Storm cut short (not their fault) and D-Von winning a title. I still can’t get over that. Anyway, bad show but the last part helped it. They’re probably lucky that non many people were watching tonight though.

Results
James Storm b. Bully Ray – Last Call
Austin Aries b. Zema Ion – Last Chancery
Samoa Joe/Magnus b. Matt Morgan/Crimson – Middle Rope Elbow To Morgan
D-Von b. Robbie E – Spinebuster
AJ Styles/Mr. Anderson b. Christopher Daniels/Kazarian – Styles Clash to Kazarian
Kurt Angle b. Jeff Hardy – Pin while holding the rope
Robert Roode b. Sting – Pin after Sting hit his head on a chair

It’s official: the apocalypse is upon us.

ECW on Sci-Fi
Date: June 20, 2006
Location: Pepsi Arena, Albany, New York
Commentators: Joey Styles, Taz

This is going to be the new series that I do and since I already posted the first episode of it, here’s the second. This is when the show was still live and in theory, they actually had a clue as to what they were doing. Like I said that’s in theory so I wouldn’t put a lot of stock into it. Let’s get to it.

We open with a fortune teller who would become known as Ariel talking about Raw last night. ECW invaded and basically took over the show with Sabu destroying Cena. There’s a main event tag tonight.

Drowning Pool gets us going.

Oh and Vengeance is the Sunday after this so there were only two weeks between PPVs.

Sabu vs. Tony Mamaluke

Makaluke is in the FBI and has the scantily clad Trinity from TNA with him. Sabu dives for the knee and drops an elbow for two. Mamaluke comes back with a belly to back suplex for two. Springboard Air Sabu gets two. Out to the floor and Sabu grabs a chair and hits a triple jump plancha. A table gets set up but Tony makes a comeback and hits Sabu with the chair. He tries to come off the top but Sabu throws the chair at Mamaluke to knock him out of the air. Sabu puts him through the table and a Camel Clutch ends this.

Rating: D+. Energetic match here as Sabu was much better in WWE than he was in ECW. If nothing else, he didn’t botch half of the moves that he was trying. Also, it’s nice to see an actual match for the opener instead of Sandman vs. a zombie like we saw last week, whatever that was.

Kelly is an exhibitionist but last week she couldn’t get her bra off. This week she’ll be able to.

RVD says that he’s in a tag match tonight and he’s excited for it. It’s him/Angle vs. Edge/Orton.

Big Show vs. Tommy Dreamer

Apparently this isn’t a match. Dreamer praises Show for being dominant last week but says that if Show wants to mean something in ECW, he has to go through Dreamer. Dreamer slaps him and the pain begins. This isn’t a match but rather just a long beating. Why it’s not a match is probably because it’s ECW and things are different here I guess.

Vengeance preview focuses on DX.

Kevin Thorn, a vampire, is outside.

Sandman vs. Macho Libre

Remember the movie Nacho Libre? This is a guy in the same costume imitating Randy Savage. He even does a promo in Spanish in a Savage voice. Well that’s….different. Sandman comes in (with an inset promo talking about nothing in particular) and wins with the legsweep in about 35 seconds.

Cena has arrived and Heyman says it’s time for action.

Heyman tells the ECW guys to be ready for Cena. Cena pops in (getting the loudest face reaction of the show) and wants Sabu in an Extreme Lumberjack match, with the ECW guys being the lumberjacks this coming Sunday. Sabu says deal, breaking one of the major rules of ECW: SABU DOESN’T TALK!

Kelly (not Kelly Kelly yet, just Kelly) dances to a Snoop Dogg song. Oh and she’s a Vixen, which is what ECW calls its girls. She dances for awhile and finally takes her top off but as she goes to take her bra off, Mike Knox debuts and covers her up.

Test is coming to ECW.

Edge/Randy Orton vs. Kurt Angle/Rob Van Dam

This is inter-promotional apparently. It’s also the first time Orton and Edge have teamed up. Edge starts with Angle and Kurt takes him to the mat with a double leg almost immediately. Off to Van Dam who crotches Orton and hits the flying kick to send Orton to the floor. This is ECW Rules. Ok then. A moonsault to the floor takes Orton down again. Orton gets in a shot as they come back in and it’s off to Edge.

Edge takes a kick in the face as well but Lita pulls the top rope down to prevent Rolling Thunder. Back with RVD and Edge slugging it out. Edge takes him down and it’s back to Orton. RVD gets thrown to the floor as the fans call Lita a sl**. Back to Orton who hits a dropkick and then brings the Canadian back in. Van Dam gets in a kick and brings in Angle for Rolling Germans.

There’s a German for the Canadian from the American and Kurt hooks the ankle lock on Randy. Edge makes the save but jumps into a belly to belly. Kurt loads up the Angle Slam on Edge but Orton clips him and focuses on the knee. Back to Edge who gets two but Angle hooks a rear naked choke that he was using at this time. Lita saves and the fans think she’s a crack w****.

Orton comes in and Kurt grabs a quick ankle lock but Edge saves and comes back in. Angle snaps off a German and both guys are down. There’s the tag to Van Dam who cleans house. He kicks Edge down and dives outside onto Orton. Rob grabs a chair and blasts Orton with it from the apron, only to be knocked into the table by Edge. Angle grabs the ankle lock on Edge then “Angle Slams” Lita. He walks into an RKO but Van Dam kicks Orton’s head off. Rolling Thunder is broken up again by Edge but as Edge tries the spear, Rob rams him in the head with a belt. Five Star gets the pin.

Rating: B-. Good main event style tag match here which is a good way to close the show. At the end of the day though, you have one ECW original and three WWE guys out there. It’s not like that bombed in the Invasion or anything but hey, that was five years before this so we can’t expect WWE to remember something like that right?

Overall Rating: C. Not a bad show overall and WAY better than the first one. The problem here though is WAY too much emphasis on WWE guys while Rob and Sabu are the only ECW guys being given anything significant to do. That’s the problem you get when you treat all the outsiders like jobbers, but then again the Alliance was five years ago so who can remember that?

Here’s Vengeance if you’re interested:

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