WWA: The Reckoning
Date: June 8, 2003 (Taped May 25, 2003)
Location: North Shore Events Centre, Auckland, New Zealand
Attendance: 3,000
Commentators: Jeremy Borash, Glenn Gilbertti

Some native Australians do a war dance.

We get a clip of Sting winning the world title at a house show. Jarrett is here tonight with the NWA World Title for a unification match.

Opening sequence.

Rick Steiner vs. Mark Mercedes

Off to a front facelock followed by a chinlock with Rick in trouble. The fans are all over Mark here and Rick comes back with a boot in the corner and some Steiner Lines. An overhead suplex puts Mercedes down but Mercedes comes back with some shots in the corner. He puts Rick on the middle rope but gets punched down, allowing the Steiner Bulldog to connect for the pin.

Puppet vs. Teo vs. Meatball

Teo comes back with a low headbutt to Meatball in the corner but a double team takes Teo down. The 250lb Meatball turns on Puppet and hits a cartwheel into an elbow for two. Meatball accidentally sends Puppet to the floor and a Swanton Bomb from Teo is good for the pin. At least it was, ahem, short.

Konnan vs. Devon Storm

WWA Cruiserweight Title/TNA X-Division Title: Kazarian vs. Jerry Lynn vs. Johnny Swinger vs. Chris Sabin

Swinger finally comes back in to stomp Kaz into the corner before hooking up with Sabin for a double flapjack. Lynn comes in off the top to take both Kaz and Sabin down with a cross body and a bad looking rana puts Kaz down. Swinger puts Lynn in the figure four as the other two are out on the floor. Sabin and Kaz come off the top to break it up and both get two counts.

Lynn loads up a dive on Swinger but walks into a superkick from Kaz, allowing Kaz to hit the big dive on Swinger instead. Lynn dives on both guys after getting a running start off an Irish whip from Sabin. Sabin hits a big dive onto all three guys to put everyone down. Sabin monkey flips Kaz into a double clothesline to take the other two down before Sabin belly to back superplexes Kaz off the top in another big crash.

Sabu vs. Joe E. Legend

Shane jumps in on commentary to further annoy me. Legend quickly takes it to the mat into a headscissors before we get to the insane stuff. Joe wins a quick slugout and chokes in the corner but gets caught in a springboard tornado DDT for two. We head to the floor for a flip dive by Sabu before Legend stomps away back inside. They head back outside for a big springboard dive from Sabu as Shane blames Sabu for killing ECW.

WWA World Title/NWA World Title: Sting vs. Jeff Jarrett

They fight over a lockup to start with Sting shoving Jarrett away. A pair of shoulder put Jarrett down and we have a standoff. Jeff comes back with right hands and struts a bit but Sting comes back with some atomic drops and a bulldog to send Jeff to the outside. They head to the floor for some brawling with Jeff being sent into the announce table over and over.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up my book on the History of Starrcade from Amazon for just $4 at:

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Date: February 21, 1998
Location: ECW Arena, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Commentator: Joey Styles

I downloaded this like three months ago and never got around to reviewing it. I also have the 99 version and November to Remember 1995 which is allegedly the best ECW show ever and I’ll be getting to those this week I hope. Anyway, this is the internet convention or whatever and it’s basically just a really big house show. As you all know I’m not that fond of ECW’s PPV years so let’s get to it.

Don’t like the company, still dig that freaking theme song.

We start with the ring filling up for a ten bell salute to Louie Spicolli who died 6 days before this show. Whoa wait: DROZ worked for ECW? Heyman talks about how there’s a group that talks about being a member of it for life. It’s a nice marketing line but in ECW that’s reality. This show is dedicated to Louie Spicolli and there’s a Louie chant. Ten bell salute goes off.

Danny Doring vs. Jerry Lynn

Lynn is “Dynamic” here. Was he ever not old? Even here he’s 35. Technical stuff to start and Doring struts a bit, which is called the Dastardly Shuffle by Joey. Dang those fans are loud. Lynn makes fun of the Shuffle and we get into some technical stuff. Roadkill trips Lynn but Doring misses a bottom rope (yes bottom rope) elbow. Rather back and forth stuff here as Lynn takes over again.

Suplex gets two and a headbutt misses to let Doring take over again. On the floor Roadkill and Doring mess up and the heels go into the crowd. Lynn is like cool dude and gets a running start off the apron and dives over the railing with a flip dive to take them both out. Lynn misses a middle rope leg drop and Doring takes over again. Tiger Bomb gets two for Doring but he might have hurt his elbow.

The distraction lets Roadie come in and hit a walk the top rope (AmishTaker according to Joey) elbow which the referee misses somehow. Doring of course has to be a jerk and wastes time so it’s only a two count. Doring puts him on top and Lynn hits a sunset bomb for the pin out of nowhere. Oh apparently Doring is afraid of heights. Got it. Makes limited sense but got it.

Rating: C. Meh match here but it wasn’t bad. Lynn is solid in the ring but Doring is just a wrestler and not that interesting in the slightest. Nothing match here but that doesn’t mean it was bad. They needed more to work with and Doring needs WAY more charisma, which he wouldn’t really get. Decent enough opener though.

Al Snow vs. Tracy Smothers

Al is in the middle of the push of a lifetime which would ultimately fail because Shane Douglas HAD to lose the title to Taz and NO ONE ELSE so Al’s push was wasted but whatever. Tracy is part of the FBI and is more or less a comedy character. The fans do the mannequin head rave thing. The entrance is taking forever. The ring is full of the heads now.

And now let’s keep the rave thing going and START THE SONG AGAIN. Snow clears the ring and shakes the head a lot. Somehow there’s a chair in the ring and we go through the introductions. All of Smothers’ entourage get introductions also. And let’s stall some more now. The bell has already rung by the way. The FBI leaves and Snow stays in the ring. And now there are birds chirping. Snow’s entrance started 8 minutes ago.

The bell rings again and we still haven’t had any contact here. AND THEY STALL AGAIN. They haven’t even touched each other yet, nor have they been in the ring alone more than 5 seconds in a row. Now the fans want pizza. Even free pizza couldn’t make this interesting. Hey they’re in the ring at the same time. HE LOCKED UP WITH HIM! There’s a Guido’s Polish chant.

Snow grabs the head again and I want a grilled cheese. I’d rather listen to the music video called Grilled Cheese from the new Looney Tunes Show than keep watching this “match.” Don’t ask why I know it’s on or anything. Just forget I said that actually. Smothers is on the floor again as we’re well over fifteen minutes into this segment now counting intros. Joey is making fun of the Godfather to kill time. Not the wrestler. The movie. We’ve sunk that low.

Snow stops to touch the mannequin again as the ring is filled with smoke for some reason. Did Van Dam get lost under the ring or something? Guido pulls the top rope down and we go to the floor to waste some time. The fans want to know where the fire is. We actually GET SOME WRESTLING and as average as it is, this is a breath of freaking air. Tommy Rich comes in with an Italian flag shot to change the momentum again.

Out to the floor and the FBI double teams Snow. You know if I told you Al Snow vs. Tracy Smothers was going to get twenty minutes in a segment with no signs of stopping, I might be tempted to say that show is going to suck. Double team in the ring now but it’s ECW so that’s all cool. Oh sweet merciful toothpaste it’s a chinlock. The Italian hits a…no screw that. I’m not wasting one of my signature lines on a twenty three minute (so far) Tracy Smothers match.

Sitout powerbomb gets two for Snow. Guido interferes AGAIN and a leg lariat gets two for Smothers. Snow starts his comeback and hits a moonsault for two. He sends Smothers to the outside and this a top rope moonsault onto all three Italians. Chair to the head slows him down a bit. Oh good night now the referee is bumped. EVERYTHING IS NO DISQUALIFICATION! WHY DO YOU NEED TO BUMP THE REFEREE???

The crooked referee Jeff Jones comes out and is in a WWF referee shirt and hat. Everyone beats on Al as Jones is like this is cool with me. Naturally four grown men and a flag stick beating on you for a minute is nothing though as Snow grabs the head and blasts everyone with it. Tommy Rich is bleeding. Snow Plow for all the heels and a top rope head shot to Tracy’s balls ends this.

Rating: I. As in if you don’t know what I thought of this match, go play in traffic. Like immediately. Let me put this in perspective. This match/segment got 32 minutes in total. The original Hell in a Cell match, as in probably the best match the Undertaker has ever had and one of the most violent matches ever, got thirty from bell to bell. Just let that sink in for a bit.

Doug Furnas vs. Chris Chetti

Furnas is “from the WWF”, complete with a manager dressed like Vince carrying a big WWF flag. That being said, he comes out to Sad But True which was one of the first rock songs I ever got into so I can’t say he’s not making me smile a bit. Actually I can say that, but it’s a figure of speech. You get the idea I’m sure. They go to the mat almost immediately and the fans applaud. Gee that’s nice of them.

Chetti gets some clotheslines but a rana is blocked by a powerbomb. Furnas starts in on the back and yells at the fans some. Into a Liontamer and Chetti takes a beating for awhile. Belly to belly superplex gets two. The fans chant boring so Chetti hits a DDT and a double jump moonsault for the pin. Even Joey sounds shocked.

Rating: D+. Nothing to see here. Chetti wasn’t anything until he hooked up with Nova a few years later. This was just there to get Chetti on the card I guess. It kind of sucks that he wasn’t interesting in the slightest. Furnas had a good look but no one cared about it. The WWF invader thing didn’t help him either.

The Vince look-a-like says Furnas is property of the WWF and he’s not thrilled with that. Furnas raises Chetti’s hand and almost kills the manager (Mr. Wright).

Joey welcomes us to the show…an hour into it. He talks about a dream partner tag match on Sunday where the tag champions will both pick mystery partners and face each other. Chris Candido is picking Shane Douglas but Storm won’t say who he’s picking. Joey brings out the Triple Threat (ECW’s version of the Horsemen but with better looking women) to try to get some answers.

This incarnation is Douglas, Candido and Bigelow. They even have hand signals. Shane…just get over it dude. Sunny is hotter than it should be legal to be. This was during Shane’s RIDICULOUS title reign that I still say is what killed the promotion. Shane won the title and him dropping it to Taz was more or less set in stone. Then Shane got hurt and he kept the title an extra SIX MONTHS so he could drop it to Taz. The problem was that by the time he finally did it, Taz’s heat was gone and the title change meant nothing. Shane held the title for all of 1998 so him talking about Taz here wouldn’t be paid off for nearly a year.

Shane talks down to Taz about his TV Title as apparently the Triple Threat hasn’t been around long. Well at least this incarnation hasn’t. Shane wants to know who Storm’s partner is but Candido says it doesn’t matter. Sunny knows who the partner is but won’t tell anyone. Apparently there are a lot of secrets she has from Candido and they get in an argument. This of course was a fake fight and they would be reunited at the PPV when Sunny was the partner for about a minute. The REAL partner (I think) was AL Snow.

Lance Storm vs. Chris Candido

They’re tag champions and they HATE each other. For no apparent reason Candido does a full entrance here. All Storm to start and a baseball slide puts Chris in the fans. Big plancha takes Candido out further. DOWN GOES SIGN GUY!!! The fans of course like Sunny more than anyone else and can you blame them? Candido fires off some chops to get some WOOs going.

Storm misses Candido and almost hits his face on the buckle. Close enough I guess as he sells it anyway. Delayed vertical is countered but Candido gets a neckbreaker for no cover. He’d rather pose a bit instead. Off to a chinlock which doesn’t last long. Storm tries to make his comeback but gets caught in a release powerslam. Storm comes back with chops as there are fans dressed as Bigelow and Sabu.

Big spinwheel kick puts Chris down again as does a dropkick which gets two. Storm misses a jump though and gets crotched on the top. Belly to back superplex gets two for Candido. Northern lights suplex gets two. Powerbomb doesn’t work and Storm gets a kick to take over. Candido fires off a super rana but he delays in covering again so it’s only two. They go the top again and Storm fights back and hits the Blonde Bombshell (top rope powerbomb and Candido’s finisher) for the pin.

Rating: C. Eh not bad and WAY better than anything else tonight, but just kind of there. These two feuded forever and had much better matches but this was ok. I’d rather have just looked at Sunny for the ten minutes they had for the match though. Not much and the whole Candido/Sunny issues went nowhere.

TV Title: Brakkus vs. Taz

Brakkus is more or less an American version of Rob Terry and is also “a WWF guy”. Actually he was in WWF for awhile and did nothing at all. Taz takes him down almost immediately and hits the crossface punches. Brakkus hits a powerbomb and his manager Droz sets up a table. Another powerbomb hits but the powerslam through the table is countered into a suplex through it. Gorilla press is countered into a Tazplex and the Tazmission ends this quick. Taz would lose the title Sunday to Bigelow in the match where they broke the ring.

Justin Credible vs. Tommy Dreamer

First blood here. Dreamer in a gimmick match that makes things more violent? Who would have seen that coming? Justin has been talking about Tommy’s family apparently. Oh and they’re having a regular match Sunday. Of course they are. One great thing about these old ECW shows: Beaulah. She is freaking gorgeous on all levels. Dreamer brings a trashcan lid with him because that’s how he rolls.

Out to the floor almost immediately as the fans make fun of Nicole Bass. She’s Justin’s bodyguard if that clears anything up. Dreamer hits a slingshot into a chair into the post. So what was the point of the chair if the post was already back there? Cactus Clothesline over the railing by Dreamer puts them both into the crowd. Time to walk around the arena like in every big ECW brawl.

We’re already on our third chant that implies Bass is a male. Jason, Justin’s uh…..friend I guess, interferes and a reverse DDT puts Dreamer down. The chair gets wedged between the top two ropes and Dreamer goes head first into it. Justin suplexes him onto the chair which doesn’t really hurt the head. Then again no one accused Justin of being all that intelligent.

A second suplex is countered and here comes Dreamer. Neckbreaker out of the corner still doesn’t work on the head at all. Beaulah and Jason have a quick argument in the ring which results in the referee taking a road sign shot to the head. Death Valley Driver puts Justin down as the fans chant Louie. DDT onto the chair but still no blood.

Time for the barbed wire and Tommy wraps it around himself. Seriously, does no one in ECW think these things through? A splash off the top hits Justin and Dreamer is in agony. And here’s RVD with a top rope kick to put a trashcan into the head of Dreamer. Barbed wire into his head plus a trashcan to the barbed wire wrapped around Dreamer’s head busts him open. A tombstone kills Beaulah and the referee wakes up in time to see Dreamer’s blood to end this.

Rating: D+. Just a weak match here that for the most part had no psychology at all. The run in made no sense but I guess it’s something that you need to watch the TV show to get. Also, what’s the point in having a gimmick match a week before a regular match? Either way, nothing of note here and just your usual brawl in ECW.

Jason gets beaten up with barbed wire post match and Dreamer chokes him with it for a bit.

Here are the Dudleys who aren’t the tag champions at the moment. We do get the always funny Joel Gertner entrance. Apparently the Dudleys just got back from Japan and they’re now the United States Intercontinental TV Western States Heritage Tag Team Champions. Gertner does the entrances, saying that he delivers more package than UPS. Apparently Big Dick Dudley has damaged more hotels than the entire US Hockey Team.

D-Von is getting jiggy with it before your very eyes and is very muscular apparently and is the Super Cruiserweight Champion of the World. Ok then. Bubba is the chairman of the Dudleyville Olympic Committee. These things take forever but they’re always funny. Joel says this is the gold, now send in the silver and the bronze. Good line.

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.

Shane Douglas/Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Rob Van Dam/Sabu

Main event here and at least Francine is looking good. The entrances take a good while. And now we stall. Shane is starting for his team. Not sure on an opponent at the moment but Fonzie blows the whistle a lot. Ok so it’s Rob. He has his own whistle and gets into a whistling contest. Whistling while stalling? Larry would be proud (double rep to the first person to get this reference. It’s about Larry Zbyszko, but what makes this one special?)

Rob fires off strikes but Shane avoids all of them. Van Dam tries his split legged move but gets stomped on to give Shane a brief advantage. Rob takes over with a kick and it’s time to work on the arm. Now Shane works on the arm. Off to Sabu who throws on the one arm camel clutch. Both non Triple Threat guys hit slingshot legdrops which gets a total of two on Shane.

Back to the Clutch and let’s WHISTLE BABY! Or since it’s Fonzie let’s WHISTLE DADDY! Total domination of the champion so far. Rob suplexes him back into the ring after a quick trip to the apron which gets two. More Clutching and Rob adds a spin kick to the back. Rob struts and says WOO but his split legged moonsault eats knees. Hot tag to Bigelow and Van Dam is in trouble.

DDT gets two as Sabu has to save. Double underhook release powerbomb and a headbutt by Bigelow and it’s back to Douglas. You know because he did so well in the first five minutes right? His hair is untied now so he looks a bit more ticked off. Time for the chinlock but Rob escapes and brings in Sabu. Time for the weapons to come in as Shane is sent to the floor and popped with a chair to the back.

Back in the ring a butterfly suplex puts Sabu down and we get a pair of tags. Bigelow mauls Van Dam but Greetings From Asbury Park is broken up. Sabu kind of hits a dive to the floor to Shane as this is breaking down quickly. Van Dam manages a decent rana on Bigelow all things considered. Everyone is on the floor now and Bigelow rams Rob into the post. Shane crotches Sabu on it as well and the Triple Threat is in control.

Bigelow and Van Dam are in the crowd now with Bigelow dominating him. Rob fights out and hits something that the cameras mostly miss. Sabu and Van Dam hit what would be called Poetry in Motion but Sabu botches it and hits Shane in the balls instead of the chest. Top rope….something takes Bigelow down as the tagging has been completely forgotten by this point.

Shane ducks a kick to send Rob into the ropes. Bigelow throws Shane over the top into the other two guys to take them both down. Apparently there was a table in there but you couldn’t see it. They’re walking around now because they’ve used most of their spots now. Table is brought in by Bigelow but according to hardcore wrestling law #1, he goes through it. Van Daminator takes Shane down for two.

Everything slows down now as another table is brought in and they have to take their time to make sure their plan goes perfectly well. Sabu puts Shane on the table and he goes through it. I don’t mean Sabu did anything to put him through it. I mean the table couldn’t hold his weight. What do you think the fans think of that? Shane goes through another table head first (it was in the corner) but Bigelow saves again. Fonzie gets involved and Bigelow tosses him away. Greetings From Asbury Park out of nowhere to RVD ends this.

Rating: D+. The first half of this when it was a regular tag match was pretty decent but after that it just fell apart. These guys getting 23 minutes just wasn’t a good idea at all. If you cut off about 8 minutes of the brawling, this would be a pretty good match. Shane is so out of his element in brawls it’s unreal. I mean, he’s just a decent in ring wrestler. What place could he possibly have in a wrestling company?

Sabu and Van Dam tease brawling post match but that wouldn’t be for awhile if I remember correctly.

Overall Rating: D. Well this could have been a lot worse. It’s really not a horrible show but with a lot of the matches just being bizarre choices (I mean seriously, Snow vs. Smothers for HALF AN HOUR???) and some matches seemingly running out of ideas halfway through, it’s hard to get into this. Not horrible, but really just a big house show. Nothing wrong with that, but not very inspiring.

The Night The Line Was Crossed
Date: February 5, 1994
Location: ECW Arena, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Attendance: 1,000
Commentator: Joey Styles

So this is it. This is allegedly the show where everything came together for ECW and became AWESOME. I’ve heard great things about the triple threat main event and I’ve heard it’s incredibly overrated. I’ve never seen it before so we’ll see if it’s either of them. I tend to hate triple threats in general so I wouldn’t put much stock in me liking this one either. Other than that not a ton matters as it’s about two hours and ten minutes long and the main event is an hour even. Let’s get to it.

Tod (and yes that’s how it’s spelled onscreen) Gordon says ECW is insane and therefore may not be appropriate for everyone. That was their tagline back in the day and it’s either brilliant or stupid.

Mr. Hughes vs. Sal Bellomo

This is the home video version so Chad Austin vs. 911 is left out. The arena is more or less dark here and it comes off as rather weird looking. Hughes is famous as the bodyguard character while Bellomo is just weird. I smell a squash here. Hughes and Jason come out to bad rap music. Let’s get this over with please. Bellomo looks like Hagrid from Harry Potter if that gives you any idea of what he looks like.

Sal goes for the arm and it doesn’t work at all. Hughes is pure heel here but it getting killed. Hughes is one of the few guys to play exactly the same character for the vast majority of his career and to never change a thing. It’s nothing special at all, but to be a bodyguard character this long is saying something. Now if only I knew what that was. Joey says the punches he throws are from St. Louis, Missouri. That’s a decent line if he’s from there. Shame it’s Kansas City. A HORRIBLE Boss Man Slam ends it.

Rating: D. Total squash that went too long. I never got the appeal of Bellomo but he was pushed forever here. He was a glorified jobber in the 80s in the WWF and he’s a big deal in ECW. There are his career highlights. This was a bad opener to say the least.

Sandman/Tommy Cairo vs. Pitbull/Rockin Rebel

This is a dog collar chain match. Sandman is getting more ticked off at this point but is still a beach guy. Jason is managing Pitbull #1 (Gary Wolfe) for you ECW fans that care. Wolfe and Cairo are chained together as are the other combination. They might have been in the ring for 6 seconds and then they hit the floor. Rebel is busted open and I think Cairo is too. Well that didn’t take long.

It’s more general insanity but unlike the last show I did the cameras can actually zoom in a bit. You can barely see things but it’s better than not being able to see at all. You can tell who is who here and you can tell what they’re doing. Pitbull gets two in the ring on Cairo. A bunch of violence leads to Cairo pinning Pitbull with a belly to belly. More brawling follows.

Rating: D+. Not terrible I guess and there seemed to be a reason for this….whatever it was. Sandman would start his transformation soon enough and make himself an ECW legend, changing the company forever. At this point he was terrible though, as were the other three so there you are.

Bruise Brothers vs. Public Enemy

The Bruise Brothers are the Harris Twins in gimmick number 3948. They have long hair here and would be in WWF soon enough. This is more brawling and anything goes stuff which is in the crowd immediately. I think I sense a theme building here. About a minute in all four guys disappear as the camera work is making my head hurt. Joey talks about how you’re only going to see this stuff in Philly. Is that a good thing I guess?

ALL Bruise Brothers here which isn’t likely to last long. Joey points out that this isn’t wrestling but rather a street fight. The announcer says we’re five minutes in. Yeah that’s really what I care about right now. That’s the NWA for you: make sure we follow TRADITION of telling us how long we’re going and bring us out of the possible adrenaline rush that this match is supposed to bring.

Rock gets slammed on Joey’s table and he has a freaking heart attack over it which is always amusing. Joey is obsessed with what the Harris’ home is like. Grunge throws some powder in one of their eyes. A 2×4 shot ends it as the Public Enemy stay dominant in ECW and I’d bet undefeated.

Rating: D. This was just too insane and it hurt things a lot I think. Nothing of note happened here and after the first big brawl, this looked a lot weaker. It was fine for a brawl, but brawling can only get you so far, which is a lesson this company never wanted to learn.

Tommy Dreamer vs. Jimmy Snuka

Snuka is EVIL here and Dreamer is a pure rookie. I’ve seen this before somewhere. Dreamer is from Dreamland USA. Wow indeed. He’s the pretty boy in bright blue tights here and no one cares about him. Snuka is by far the biggest star in the company at this point. Joey promises a classic. That’s never a good sign. Dreamer is 22, my age, here. That’s hard to imagine as he’s always been old.

Lots of stalling to start as we just had to stretch this show out further didn’t we? Dreamer puts on the hat of a kid for no apparent reason. After about three minutes of stalling we lock up and go to a headlock. And now we stall some more. I thought WE WRESTLE IN THE NWA! The fans chant for Piper although I’m not sure why. Would it kill you guys to do something?

Snuka pops him with a pretty weak chair shot on the floor in by far the most interesting move of the match so far. Dreamer kicks out of the Superfly Splash and Joey apparently thinks he can walk on water too. Snuka hits two more of them and Dreamer is more or less dead. He’s bleeding from the mouth and Snuka finally pins him. He beats up some referees and other people afterwards and hits a fourth splash on Dreamer. Gordon comes out and gets beaten up too.

Rating: F+. This was about 80% stalling and then a bunch of splashes. It was like a weird kind of squash and by that I mean it wasn’t any good. The stalling is what hurts this as it’s nearly 8 minutes long and WAY too much of it was just them standing around and yelling at the crowd. Snuka wouldn’t mean anything in the long run anyway as he was only around for a few months after this while Dreamer became one of the biggest stars in the company.

Kevin Sullivan/Tazmaniac vs. Original Sheik/Pat Tanaka

Sullivan/Taz are tag champions but the belts are being held up for some reason. This could be brutally bad and likely will be. Woman in a suit is oddly sexy actually. Taz is insane here and looks like a caveman. Tanaka is in street clothes just because he can be. Sullivan is bleeding 9 seconds in which might be a record even for him. Tanaka has a bad ankle so while the guys with S’s in their name fight Taz goes for a half crab.

The wide shots during brawls are really annoying. Sheik is 66 years old here and this is the first recorded match I can find for him in 13 years. He throws a fireball at Taz and Tanaka pins him. Yeah that’s it.

Rating: N/A. This was really short and really bad. Yeah….the whole 66 year old in a match this is pretty stupid. Somehow Flair isn’t that far off from it. He’s light years ahead of this though. Sheik and Sullivan fight even more for a little while.

JT Smith vs. Mike Awesome

This would be a squash in the regular ECW. Here it’s going to be a squash but with a different ending. If you want to see an example of why Awesome is so beloved, watch this match as he’s INSANE but great. He never lets up at all and hits a great over the top rope dive to nearly kill Smith. And then the hometown boy rolls him up for a pin in his only offense all night. Referee gets beaten up anyway. He goes for the splash and breaks the freaking ring ropes.

Rating: N/A. Total squash for Awesome and he lost anyway. He would go to Japan soon after and other than one other time in 94, wouldn’t be seen in ECW until 97. He would wrestle five times there and then would go winless in 1998. FINALLY in 1999 Heyman realized he had something amazing and made him world champion.

Shane Douglas vs. Sabu

This is a #1 contenders match and the title match will take place immediately afterwards. Heyman runs out with a phone and blasts Shane’s manager, Sherri, to take her out. With over an hour to go, this is the main event, and yes it’s that long. Joey has audio trouble so while he’s shouting you can’t understand a word of it. You can hear the crowd so clearly my audio is working.

Ah there he is. If there’s no winner here then it’s a three way for the title. The time limit here is only 15 minutes so I’m not expecting much. 911 is on the floor with Heyman as it’s all Shane at this point. Sabu hits a spinning kick which is really just an elbow as the foot never gets close. That’s par for the course with him though so there we are. Five minutes in and this is one sided. The king of Bombay, Michigan works the right arm of all things and the fans want Funk.

Dang he really is cranking on that thing and it looks great. The arm work goes on for a very long time. Shane gets out with an FU of all things. Man Cena if you’re going to use the same moves at least don’t copy them. Dang dude. Ten minutes in and it’s not bad so far. Shane with a big boot? What the heck??? He’s not even tall enough for that but whatever.

We hit the floor with three minutes left. It’s pretty clear that Funk is going to be involved here. It’s not like that was a real secret or anything. Sabu gets a chair on the floor and it results in Shane being on a table. Good thing Sabu misses it completely and lands in the crowd. Sabu is more or less dead with 30 seconds left. For no apparent reason Shane doesn’t cover him and here’s Terry.

ECW Title: Shane Douglas vs. Terry Funk vs. Sabu

Ok so is this 60 minutes or are Shane and Sabu going 75? Sabu leaves, I guess with an injury and it’s Shane vs. Terry. Given that we have less than an hour in the tape and there are post match interviews, the whole thing is an hour but Funk only has to go 45. Ok then. Funk hits a piledriver on the floor but we can’t see all of it since it’s not on the camera side. To be fair the same thing happened at the end of the 94 Rumble so that’s a thing of the times and not ECW.

Funk hits a pair of DDTs in the ring (one like a football being spiked and one being like a basketball being bounced according to Joey). Terry wants a chair so about 6 people throw them in. They get piled up and Shane takes ANOTHER DDT on them. Seriously that’s all we’ve had from Funk so far: DDTs and a piledriver. Shane manages to beat Funk to his feet after that DDT which is odd.

Shane beats on Funk who now has a bad back it seems. This is moving REALLY slowly and nothing of note is happening. We had a long stretch of brawling in the audience and nothing of note happened. Douglas mixes things up with a DDT of his own. How innovative! All Shane here as Funk is busted open. The referee goes down at some point and this is literally putting me to sleep.

They slug it out for a bit and then head into the crowd. We’re 30 minutes in here and are in the crowd. This has been far from great like it’s built up to be. For some reason the arena looks like it’s full of smoke. So yeah the whole one hour three way dance thing is pretty much nonsense. Ah here’s Sabu FINALLY after being gone about fifteen minutes. Funk comes up towards the announce table and steals a mic, Joey’s in this case, thinking he’s yelling at the crowd and therefore the guys in the ring. The problem is that he’s yelling into Joey’s mic so only the people watching the tape can hear him. Brilliant.

We’re thirty five minutes in and Sabu is in a spinning toehold. 911 comes in and lets Heyman hit Funk with the phone (it’s Paul E. Dangerously but you get the idea). Terry gets a neckbreaker on the guy whose neck would be broken by Benoit later on but Heyman saves again. The triple sleeper spot hits which is either creative or idiotic. I’m not sure why it would be idiotic but it has that feeling to it. Again, no idea why.

Now it’s basically who can get the longest leg lock on Sabu. Shane puts on a Figure Four, but remember that Ric Flair is a horrible man. We hit 40 minutes and Heyman saves Sabu again. Sabu botches the heck out of a springboard moonsault. Sherri is in the ring for no apparent reason. Axl and Ian Rotten come out to help Funk as Shane gets two on Sabu. Sabu botches a rana and Terry leaves. Yeah…..this whole triple threat has been a triple threat for about 3 minutes out of almost 45.

A springboard legdrop hits Shane in a clip from Rise and Fall of ECW. And here are the Rottens to beat up both guys again. This is making my head hurt. We’re 45 minutes in so I only have 15 minutes left. Joey says 15 minutes left in what match? So somehow we’ve gone from Terry Funk vs. Shane vs. Sabu to Shane/Sabu vs. the Rotten Brothers. Sabu fights the Rottens to the back and Shane is alone in the ring. He just stands there and here comes Sabu….oh never mind he has to fight one of the Rottens again first.

Funk comes back, as do Paul, 911 and Ian Rotten. And now there’s no one in the ring. Hat Guy is back by the concession areas and Funk vs. Shane spills outside. This must have been RIVETING for the live crowd with no video screens. And Funk beats up the referee. Joey tries not to laugh while asking why. With ten minutes left Shane and Terry are beating each other up and we now get the clock going again on how long can all three guys be in the ring for. So far out of 50 minutes I’d guess it’s about 9 minutes.

Sabu hits a top rope moonsault and Funk’s knee is hurt. Joey says the match was over 15-20 minutes ago. To quote him, what match? Shane vs. Terry? Shane vs. Sabu? Sabu/Shane vs. the Rottens? Terry vs. one of them? Sherri vs. the laws of time and gravity? The referee stays dead for the better part of ever. He must have been watching the match.

Five more minutes and the fans suddenly get that this is going to a draw. Another new match breaks out with Terry beating up Sherri. Four minutes left and nothing at all is happening. The bald Heyman is knocked out by Shane. Let’s see: Rottens, Sherri, 911, Heyman….yeah I think that’s all. We’ve only had five run-ins so far. Three minutes and we’re out of here (the clock is ticking and we’re in the clear).

Sherri’s boot gets used a lot as Joey makes me angry by saying this is like Piper vs. Valentine from 1983. The camera goes black for a minute and we have two minutes left. Funk beats up Heyman for no good reason. Less than a minute to go and the referee has now been out over ten minutes from a single headbutt. Can we get this guy some medical attention? Two near falls within the last five seconds and that’s it. The fans give them a standing ovation for absolutely no deserved reason. This was bad…..like very bad.

Rating: D+. Cue X and jmt to come in here and explain why I just hate ECW and will never get what it’s about. While that may be true, I know a bad match. This wasn’t horrible and there have been far worse matches, but for this to be considered a classic or even a very good match is a freaking joke. This “hour long triple threat” is more like a 15 minute triple threat, two fifteen minute singles matches, a 4 minute tag match and a bunch of standing around. Sabu was SPENT about half an hour into this and he just laid on the mat for most of the time. I was bored to death watching this because the longest stretch where they’re all in the arena is about 8 minutes long. I have no idea what the standing ovation was for as this was just way too long and while it’s not horrible, it’s definitely not anywhere close to as good as it’s made out to be.

We get what are apparently famous interviews afterwards from all three guys. Terry is crying and says he loves wrestling but doesn’t like what it’s becoming. He hates what WCW is now….despite him going back there for a PPV in like 4 months. He also doesn’t like WWF….where he would be again in a few years. He puts over the company and says how great it is etc. He respects Shane and Sabu.

Heyman and Sabu come in (after Gordon thanks the guys for coming in from out of state for the press conference) and Sabu has to be held back by the security guards. Heyman claims a conspiracy and is just awesomely slick here. This goes nowhere but is kind of funny.

Shane comes in and says he should be champion because he’s the only guy that was out there for the whole hour. He has a point there, although he does claim to have smashed Funk’s knee into obliticry. Yeah it’s not a real word but whatever. Shane is FURIOUS here and here comes Terry for the big emotional showdown. Shane keeps saying he’s great and Funk doesn’t want to be called an old man. Terry hands him the belt and says it’ll be a great day when he takes it back from Shane since he’s not an old man. Shane throws it back at him and here we go again. This was good to set up the eventual one on one showdown where Shane would get the title.

Overall Rating: F+. This is it? This is the major show that got ECW noticed? Why? The best match is the overrated beyond belief triple threat and that’s decent at best. Other than that there is NOTHING here. Actually that’s not true. The post main event segments with Terry and then Terry/Shane were indeed very good.

If you cut about 30 minutes (including the opening 15 minute prematch thing) from the main event and cut out the Rottens and all the guys being carried out, this goes WAY up and I could see it being considered good. This show just wasn’t interesting at all though and the triple threat is just far too long and not very good. ECW would get a lot better in about a year though, so something worked. I don’t get the hype here at all. Now where’s X to complain about this?

November to Remember 1998
Date: November 1, 1998
Location: Lakefront Arena, New Orleans, Louisiana
Attendance: 5,800
Commentator: Joey Styles

So we’re another three months later and not a ton has changed. Shane is FINALLY coming back to the ring since you know, that whole three months of not being able to wrestle wasn’t justification to take the belt off of him AT ALL. At this point he’s held the title for just shy of a year and will hold it until January where the yearlong story with Taz will be blown off.

The main event is Sabu/Van Dam/Taz vs. the Triple Threat. Jake Roberts and Tommy Rich are here and we’re near the Gulf of Mexico. Oh dear. This sounds like HEROES OF WRESTLING all over again. Let’s get this over with, and I’m appointing X to be near me with a bottle of whiskey and a gun.

We open to New Jack jumping Jack Victory in the parking lot in black and white for no apparent reason. Metaphor for something maybe? Jack gets cuffed and taken away by conveniently present policemen. I really don’t like New Jack in case you didn’t know. I didn’t mention this but this show is more or less their Wrestlemania, so keep that in mind as I’ll be grading it as their mega show.

Joey, who looks different for some reason, runs down the card as per usual. Just to be clear: the main event of the biggest show of the year is a six man tag match with no title on the line. Just keep that in mind. And here’s Terry Funk for no apparent reason, wearing a mortarboard (hat you wear when you graduate). I love Funk’s voice. It’s just so freaking insane sounding that it’s awesome.

He’s mad that he wasn’t invited and FUNK YOU Paul E and the fans. He’s also mad about Dreamer picking someone else as his partner tonight. He says Dreamer’s father was a crackhead and his mother wasn’t a nice person. Well that’s better than smelling of elderberries and being a hamster I guess.

Dreamer comes out as Funk says he’s been practicing his double flip off the top rope and he doesn’t get to do it. This was uh, different. Yeah that’s right. It was different. Not bad or anything, just odd.

Theme song, with a graphic thanking the fans. Nothing wrong with that.

Blue World Order vs. Danny Doring/Roadkill

The BWO here are Nova and Meanie, as Richards realized he had that thing that people like called mainstream appeal so he’s in WWF at this point. Roadkill is an Amish guy, called the Angry Amish Chicken Plucker. This could be a really long night. They’re a new team here but they would eventually become kind of a big deal by ECW standards. Doring is about as bland as you could dream of a guy with his name being.

Nova has some unique offense from what I remember so this should be ok. And here’s Funk again with his own cameraman. There’s also a camera following Funk and his cameraman. Styles asks a great question: why are we focusing on Terry Funk when there’s wrestling going on. Funk takes over as timekeeper. Again, I get that he’s a far bigger star, but if you’re going to have these four guys out there, don’t take the focus off of them for Funk.

Yes he’s by far the bigger star and more important than all four combined, but show the guys some respect if you could. We get a lot of heel miscommunication to keep the faces in control as this is becoming a glorified squash. Ok the People’s Legdrop is kind of a cute idea but I’m still not huge on theatrical moves. Not a big deal at all though. And here’s Funk again to interfere and then put himself through a table.

Doring is setting for something but stops to do a strut called the Dastardly Shuffle. I like the name if nothing else. Ok seriously, have the match, or follow Funk. This is annoying. Joey makes me chuckle asking if Roadkill took a horse and buggy to New Orleans from Pennsylvania. That’s rather amusing. He does a Taker rope walk but misses the elbow drop he was trying.

Doring has a lot of long and drawn out names for his moves which is clever for some stupid reason that I don’t get but whatever. He and Nova are working the majority of the match which is intelligent. And now we have one of my biggest annoyances of ECW: claiming Monday Night shows steal all their moves. This is brought up by Nova doing a move called the Sledge-o-Matic. It’s a diving powerbomb where he goes to the side on the landing.

In other words, it’s the same move but with a slight twist that makes zero difference. It’s wrestling guys. People use the same moves quite often. You don’t see a right hand being called a Strangler Lewis Special do you? Now yes, ECW got ripped off more than any other company I can think of, but at times they got ridiculous complaining about it.

I mean really, can you imagine someone complaining about every tiny little thing that goes on at a wrestling show which no one else would have the sheer stupidity to notice since no one else would be such a bored and pathetic human being to think this in depth about such a thing? Can you imagine how pitiful that person really is? DANG they would drive me crazy. What’s the point of picking something apart and blowing the tiniest thing completely out or proportion?

Anyway, this match needs to end as the right lace of Nova’s left boot has a single thread sticking out and it’s driving me crazy. Nova hits a modified tornado DDT that is completely different than the one that Chavo Guerrero had been using around this time, because it was MODIFIED. The BWO wins it with a double team move where Meanie did a wheelbarrow lift into a DDT from Nova called the Blue Light Special.

And here’s Funk again to steal the spotlight, which yes I know that’s fine and the point. I have no problem with it here, but did we need to have him do the stuff during the match? Not that I can see of. Heyman comes out to calm him down. So in other words the ten minute match was all just to set up the Funk angle. Got it. Not that bad of an idea I guess as at least there was a full length match, unlike in WWE where it would have been lucky to go 100 seconds before Funk ran in, so points for that definitely.

Rating: D. It was a long squash and Funk stole the focus at a very annoying rate. I don’t get that but we’re just twenty three minutes into the show so maybe we’ll find out later. This wasn’t a very good match but it got the crowd going, which isn’t really something ECW needs as I always thought they had Red Bull IVs going into them but I get the idea.

We recap the tag title match with is Balls Mahoney and Masato Tanaka vs. the Dudleys. Mahoney and Tanaka had a match where they more or less had a chair duel that went to a draw. They had another and the Dudleys ran in for no apparent reason. Somehow this got Tanaka and Mahoney a tag title shot but the Dudleys beat them up beforehand so they got the shot and won the belts. Ok then.

And that match isn’t for about 40 more minutes. Why am I trying to make sense of this?

Tracy Smothers vs. Tommy Rogers

O……..k. Rodgers is one half of the Fantastics from the 80s but since he was an agent for ECW that makes sense. The FBI, the Full blooded Italians, have a German wrestler named Ulf Herman with them now. Rogers has Chris Chetti. Not actually explained but I guess it was a known thing at the time. This was a comedy stable that was very popular although I never could get into them.

Oh ok Chetti is there to watch his back against the FBI. That makes sense. I guess Chetti just sits in the back in his gear as a backup for hire? Rich complains about the town for cheap and easy heel heat. Rogers gets on the mic and points out the joke of the FBI. THANK YOU SO MUCH! Amusingly enough they make fun of the Saints and earlier today they made the Super Bowl so that’s kind of funny. The fans want their pizza.

This is a fast paced match to start off which is fine but less than two minutes in and we’ve had four interferences already. And we have the camera on Herman and Chetti who fight to the back. Oh look, MORE INTERFERING. I get that it’s a heel stable, but dude can we have ONE match with no interference? Is that too much to ask?

Guido has done three different run ins inside of two minutes. This is the straight wrestling match tonight right? Rogers looks in ok shape actually. There’s a logo in the middle of the ring now for the show which is a nice little touch. After MORE heel miscommunication, Rogers hits the Tomikaze (Unprettier/Killswitch which he used first) for the pin.

Rating: D+. This match exemplifies two of the major problems I’ve always had with ECW. Number one, while decent, what possible reason could you could up with for two guys in their late 30s of this caliber to wrestle on the biggest show of the year? I can overlook that though as the wrestling was actually rather good here so that’s excused.

However, that’s the problem here: the wrestling was rather good, but there were literally 6 different interferences in this match. Why can’t we just have a good wrestling match? Is that a sin or something?

The FBI argue/fight but instead they jump Rogers instead. Chetti comes out for the save with a nice springboard double clothesline. He hits a moonsault onto Rich and Mabel is here with Herman. Are you kidding? Is this supposed to be a major talent acquisition or something? Herman hits what would eventually evolve into the Musclebuster.

And here’s Spike Dudley to beat up Herman who is about Hall’s size and then Mabel. This makes perfect sense too. Spike gets the Acid Drop on both guys and sits on them…and the referee makes the count and calls for the bell. Yeah sure why not. Mabel would be Viscera in less than three months. The fans bought this is nothing else so I guess it had something resembling a point, and Spike was a giant killer anyway. It was quick too so that’s not so bad.

Rotten, Mahoney and Tanaka say they’re ready for the Dudleys. Rotten wasn’t terrible on the mic actually. He’s doing nothing but screaming, but he’s articulate and makes his point so I can’t complain much. Match isn’t up next though so there we go.

Lance Storm vs. Jerry Lynn

Storm has the newly appearing Tammy Lynn Bytch with him. She’s more commonly known as Dawn Marie. Sunny (Tammy Lynn Sytch but since the names would just get complicated we’ll go with Sunny and Dawn here) and Mikey Whipwreck are the guest referees. Why Mikey? Why two referees?

I’m assuming we won’t be told, but remember kids: even though ECW was marketing to the masses now and had no national television outlet, it wasn’t their fault that you didn’t get storylines that you had to live in New England to know about. Just ask any ECW mark and they’ll tell you that. I always had a big thing for Marie. Storm is freshly heel here. Everyone gets their own entrance of course, and once again let us remind you: Mikey has pinned Steve Austin.

Can’t blame them there as that is a big deal kind of. Oh wait this is 98. That’s freaking huge. We get a big recap of it with Heyman narrating and he points out that we get a great back shot in it. Heyman was different if nothing else. In a big brawl at the ECW Arena Mikey ran in to help one of the girls. That’s an explanation so I’ll give it credit for that. These recaps have been a God send as I would have no clue otherwise. Barely Legal really needed those.

And yep Sunny looks great. She knew how to carry herself better than any other woman in wrestling history, including Elizabeth. She puts her shoes on in the ring which is of course both a big production and sexy somehow. This should be good as I’ve always been a fan of Storm’s in ring stuff. One time Sunny needs to just flash the freaking crowd to end the chants.

Thankfully Mikey goes to the floor so we only have one referee in there. Still a bit overbooked but there’s a point and backstory to it at least so that’s an improvement. They are freaking MOVING out there. This is by far the hottest the crowd has been all night long. Ok so maybe the overbooking works here. Tammy really wants to get to count the pin on Storm mind you. Storm is born to be a heel really. He’s awesome at it.

We hit the floor and Lynn just goes off. I love with Storm does a springboard move. It just looks so smooth. Storm goes for another one over the top rope but hits his head/neck on the rope on the way to the floor. He’s fine but that could have been bad. Storm hits a Skull Crushing Finale which is a move I’ve always liked. Has there ever been a more painful looking move than a surfboard? I certainly can’t think of one.

Sunny’s facial expressions are awesome. I kind of like the dynamic they’re going with here as they’re not even trying to hide the biased officiating here. Here’s Dawn interfering and yep she’s getting stripped. Mikey runs in and hits the Whippersnapper on both girls. Oh never mind they blocked it on Sunny. Lynn gets one as well and that only gets a VERY long two.

Sunny messes up the one she gets but then after a small package from Lynn on Storm, Mikey reverses it so Storm has the cover and fast counts it. It was something about Storm low blowed him but Mikey couldn’t tell. The problem was that no one got that, which messed it up. The crowd went silent on that one.

Rating: B-. Seriously, Jerry Lynn and Lance Storm? I mean really Paul, do you not think that these two can have a good match without some big thing going on? I get that the interferences made sense, but dude, look at the two guys in there and tell me with a straight face that they need the help to have an entertaining match.

Funk apologizes and says he’s done with wrestling and he won’t be this much of a jerk again. Oh and this is for good. We’re at an hour, seventeen minutes and twenty-seven seconds into the video. Keep that in mind.

We recap the tag title match and then we recap Justin vs. Tommy in the dream mystery partner death match. They keep calling Justin the fastest rising star and hottest star in wrestling. They back this up by showing him breaking the leg of a Japanese star and injuring Mikey Whipwreck, caning Sandman a lot, and caning Sandman a lot.

So let me make sure I got this right. He broke the leg of a guy most people don’t know of, he injured the leg of a guy with a LONG history of knee problems, caned a guy that made a living in cane matches, and did exactly the same thing that Sandman did far more famously years ago. I have NEVER gotten the hype about Justin.

He couldn’t wrestle more than anything average, he had a gimmicky name and he didn’t look special at all. Yet Paul refused to put RVD on top over him. That makes no sense but it’s Heyman so at times it’s a wonder you can understand what he says let alone what he’s thinking.

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

We got the explanation already….45 minutes ago, but we did indeed get it. Hopefully Joel gets to talk for awhile here as he always makes me at least chuckle. We get Bubba instead, which works fine for me. Joel makes a Mark McGwire reference, which is a lot less awe inspiring now. Screw it. He saved baseball so I don’t care. He has more game than Parker Brothers too. That’s a good line.

The intro is subdued here as I guess taking ten minutes was too much. I’m guessing Rotten is hurt here or something as he’s out with them. It’s another odd tag team here with Tanaka and Mahoney. Yeah they say he has liver and kidney problem. That’s what I was thinking. I love how so many Japanese wrestlers are just from Japan. No town is ever given. It’s just Japan.

Apparently the Louisiana Athletic Commission says no chairs, but they’re going to do it anyway because the big two wishes they could do things like ECW does. I get the idea, but that’s just laughable at this time period. Rotten apparently overrides the athletic commission and chairs are legal. Even though this is a deathmatch, they’re tagging in and out. Somehow this is the most contained match of the night.

I hate nerve holds. It’s more or less a neck massage. If you insist on resting less than five minutes into the match, use a chinlock or something that looks good. Sign from Sign Guy: D-Von Stained Monica’s Dress. D-Von does a People’s Elbow but ends with a headbutt. Keep in mind that earlier on they criticized the Monday shows for stealing moves. I guess a comedy move works here.

We hit the floor and Bubba dives over the top rope to take out the other three. Yep we’re at the messy portion of tonight’s show, but this one is a deathmatch so that’s more understandable. Bubba takes four roaring elbows before going down. The managers and other guys get into it but only with each other so there’s a chance that there won’t be any interference here.

I’ll give them credit: they went an hour and forty minutes with no weapons. That sounds condescending but in reality that’s a very good thing. Over half of the show wasn’t ridiculously violent. Now it was ridiculously overbooked, but the wrestling still happened. The faces take four chair shots to the head each and then Tanaka kicks out of 3D.

AND THE DUDLEYS EXPLODE!!! Why is it that chair shots don’t put people down here? I mean it’s a freaking STEEL CHAIR. There’s strong style and there’s freaking stupidity. In a VERY funny spot, the referee goes down and we have the Dudleys’ evil referee to come in. He fakes the shoulder injury thing, and Tanaka yells at him in Japanese. Jones, the referee, pulls out a Japanese to English dictionary and I lose it. It might be that it’s 3am, but that was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen in ECW for some reason.

And now it’s table time. To continue the theme of the night, Van Dam and Sabu run in and put the champions through tables in a cool looking spot. Naturally this is enough for the titles. In other words, a splash/leg drop onto a table, meaning there was less time for RVD or Sabu to get momentum going, was enough to get the pin, but BLASTING THEM IN THE HEAD WITH A METAL CHAIR WASN’T!

Rating: D-. This was crap, plain and simple. It only passes for the dictionary spot which legitimately cracked me up. Seriously, nerve holds, no selling of chair shots, RVD and Sabu running in and all that was just too much for me. They held the belts five days anyway.

The Triple Threat says they’ll win because they’re a team.

We hear about the Triple Threat vs. the three faces tonight.

Ad for the ECW CD.

Justin Credible/Jack Victory vs. Tommy Dreamer/???

This was explained earlier so I’m not redoing it. And the mystery partner is Jake Roberts. Is this supposed to be a bigger deal than Mabel was earlier? Jake is in street clothes here. This is also a deathmatch apparently. Jake is way taller than the rest of the people in the match. He’s also in street clothes for no apparent reason. Justin beats up Tommy for awhile, including a DDT where he doesn’t actually go down with him. Yeah that was weird.

He follows that up like he does any move he does: taunting the crowd. There’s Jason coming in to make us 5/5 for interfering in matches. Yes it’s a manager so it’s a bit of a stretch but still. They go for the Raven drop toehold thing but they get it backwards somehow so Dreamer goes chest first into the back of the chair. That was just odd looking.

Dreamer finally breaks up the momentum with Emerald Frosion, a Misawa move that he had been using for years and I’m sure will now be used on Monday nights also as it’s the Dreamer Driver here. I love double standards. Jake and Dreamer set for double DDTs, but Rod Price and One Man Gang are here to give us a REAL run in. Without knowing what they’re doing here, they would be people seven and eight of Justin’s entourage (Justin, Victory, Nicole Bass, Lance Wright, Chastity, Jason). You think that’s enough???

And here are New Jack and Kronus to beat everyone up with weapons. Yeah this isn’t taking the spotlight off the big celebrity mystery partner or the big feud here at all. You know the song wouldn’t be so annoying if New Jack was actually worth a stupid thing.

Hey they stopped the song when it stopped being about New Jack. There is hope I tell you! Bass runs in and gets a low blow and Jake’s DDT for her troubles to a huge pop. It amazes me that Jake has made a second career out of showing up and hitting a single DDT and nothing else. He gets another on Justin for the pin.

Rating: D+. For once here and I have no idea why, they run ins made sense to me. Well scratch that. I can understand everything with the run ins other than Gang and Price. Now after that New Jack and Kronus make sense as they’re balancing things out. I guess the run ins made sense here, but I’ll say the same things I’ve said all night: what’s the point to it as it’s just overbooking, and second, this is the 5th match and the fifth with a run in.

When you do it that many times, it’s total overkill. Wait…Victory was NEVER IN THE MATCH. Literally, he didn’t get tagged in and Jason kept running in instead. That’s ECW for you I guess. Final thing: how can Credible be considered the hottest thing in wrestling if he never, you know, wins?

And of course Funk is here to beat the heck out of Dreamer while screaming at him to say he’s sorry and that he’s a jerk. Dreamer won’t fight back, which is a touch that I like. This would go on forever but Funk “retired” long enough to go back to WCW to watch it freaking die.

The face team talks. Read as Van Dam talks.

And now Taz breathes heavily and talks about Shane. You know, the guy he’s been talking about for the last 7 months but you know, at the biggest show of the year, we can’t have the epic title change as Shane has to hold the title for another two months to validate his useless existence. Seriously, I do not get this.

This is the big return for Shane. His injuries weren’t enough to take the title off of him, so in other words he’s going to keep the title an extra five months due to injuries and apparently some unspecified reason here.

Triple Threat vs. Sabu/Rob Van Dam/Taz

Triple Threat is Shane, Bigelow and Candido. Sabu has a neck brace on for no apparent reason. I would guess it’s due to him being Sabu. Of course there’s no actual semblance of that pesky tagging or wrestling thing. Yep it’s more brawling. I just saw the dumbest spot I’ve ever seen. Sabu sets the chair up for the triple jump over the ropes. Ok that’s fine. Shane and Bigelow look up as he’s getting to the top rope.

Now at this point, I could actually buy that they simply don’t have time to move. However, he botches the move so THEY STAY THERE WHILE HE RESETS AND DIVES ON THEM. And when I say resets, I mean he staggers on the rope, gets down and jumps again. Yeah, the heels have no issue with just standing there and letting themselves get jumped on. Do you see why this place makes my head hurt? HOLY CRAP they’re tagging!

This is just a huge mess as there’s no point to this match as nothing other than a big pin from Taz on Shane is going to happen, setting up their match probably three months from now. HERE WE GO! Taz vs. Douglas! The showdown that’s been six months….oh of course they mess it up. Instead of seeing them go one on one, we go to a shot of Van Dam balancing himself on a corner before jumping down and then throwing himself at Bigelow.

This place stuns me at times. Oh ok we’re back now. And Van Dam keeps doing flips which we keep cutting to. TAZMISSION!!!!! And Sabu hits an Arabian Facebuster from the top with a chair onto Taz then covers Shane to get the pin.

Rating: F. So let me make sure I have this straight. We’ve spent seven or eight months building to one match: Shane vs. Taz with Taz ending the epic reign of Douglas and taking the belt in a huge moment. Ok, that’s fine. That’s wrestling booking 102 or 103. I’m cool with that. So then Shane gets hurt and has to take off at least three months.

Now here you have a major dilemma and the problem with long and drawn out angles like this: (To be fair though, for a company that has 4 PPVs a year, I can completely understand wanting to wait and draw it out) what if someone gets hurt? Things can change in the interim and that’s what’s happened here. Shane was hurt so the feud was dragged out even longer. Now we get to the dumb part.

Last PPV, held on August 2nd (remember this is on November 1st) Shane announced he would return to the ring at this show. Read as: they had three months of TV to set up whatever match they wanted. And so we just set up Taz vs. Sabu? Why? This makes zero sense, but hey, it’s ECW, so it’s awesome right?

Overall Rating: F+. Did they actually think before they put this show on the air? Again as I’ve said before, it’s like they forgot they had a PPV and just threw it together in two days. This was their Wrestlemania and it’s not like they didn’t know that as Joey says that this is their showcase event to open the show. Nothing of interest happened here.

Mahoney and Tanaka lost the belts less than a week later so the title reign is up there with Volkoff and Sheik taking the belts at Wrestlemania I. This show was just a failure all around, but for some reason there was some little thing I liked about it and for the life of me I can’t put my finger on it, hence the F+. Stay away clearly.

Wrestlepalooza 1998
Date: May 3, 1998
Location: Cobb County Civic Center, Marietta, Georgia
Attendance: 3,401
Commentator: Joey Styles

It’s been two months since Living Dangerously and not a lot has changed. It’s still Snow vs. Douglas as Snow’s insane rise in popularity continues. Candido and Storm are still champions that hate each other and are defending the belts tonight in a storyline that NO ONE has ever seen before. Van Dam has begun his two year long reign with the title and has his first big defense tonight: he’s fighting Sabu. Oh this could hurt a lot. Let’s get to this as the card looks somewhere between bad and ok.

We do the intro video before the show introduction this time which I like a lot better. The other way just takes me out of the show for some reason. It usually feels like they forgot to do the show opening or something and then went back to it.

F.B.I. vs. BWO

Suddenly I want some alphabet soup. It’s Tracy Smothers and Guido vs. Super Nova and Blue Meanie. The BWO itself is actually over and dead but they both wear blue and team together still so there we are. I want to hit Tommy Rich. The guy is just freaking annoying. He gets a huge F YOU chant directed at him so at least Georgia fans are intelligent. Nova and Guido, the two talented guys, start us out.

Nova is a superhero by the way. Meanie is just a fat guy that has nothing else going for him. Nova is well known for having a very unorthodox offense and it’s on display here. Meanie comes in and Rich says we need to have a dance contest. And the referee dances too. THANKFULLY Smothers jumps Meanie to end this mindlessness. And the referee slams both heels to get two on Smothers. What the heck am I watching???

Finally we get something sensible as Smothers hits a nice bicycle kick to Nova’s head. Meanie can’t even get into the ring correctly. This is what critics mean when they say this company was a joke. When you’re that sloppy, you have no business being in a ring on a major show at all. Meanie misses the moonsault, which is just about the only move Meanie could do without injuring someone else. Nova hits a downward spiral for the pin. And the faces do the YMCA afterwards. My head hurts again.

Rating: D+. It wasn’t bad, but for the most part it was an unfunny comedy match. Nova was cool, but other than that there was just noting at all that stood out here for me. Meanie was just a fat tub of goo that never did anything of note outside of ECW (Bluedust was nothing of note and yes I know he was in WWF for awhile) and the FBI were always annoying to me. It’s not bad but it’s nothing to write home about, or better yet it’s nothing to review. Wait what?

We recap Justin Credible vs. Mikey Whipwreck. This feud is STILL going? This was just a way to get Justin over which completely failed as there was one simple problem: Justin wasn’t any good. Paul kept trying to tell us he was but it simply wasn’t there. Justin got pushed until the company folded and was getting said push over guys like RVD. That should explain a lot to you.

Justin Credible vs. Mikey Whipwreck

So Mikey’s destroyed knee is all of a sudden fine. Good to know. He gets some good punches in and we’re on the floor already. They throw Justin into the crowd and he more or less crushes a fan. I get that this is a different kind of company, but dude, don’t half crush your fans. Justin shoves Mikey off the apron so that he crashes into the guard rail. We have our first chair of the evening and Mikey takes a SICK bump into it.

That looked like it would have nearly killed him but of course he’s fine. The fans chant Aldo at Justin. He was Aldo Montoya in WWF in case you didn’t know that. If nothing else he gets a nice counter to the Whippersnapper (Stunner, which Mikey used way before Austin) by just hooking him in a reverse DDT. It was very nice indeed. These fans are really annoying.

I get that they’re a major aspect of ECW, but to fans like me who aren’t huge fans and are the audience that ECW needed to grab in order to stay in business, they’re very annoying indeed. Justin gets suplexed through a table which of course is impressive even though we see it about five times a show.

And now it’s just about the chair and nothing else. It’s just big spot, two count, chair spot, two count, big spot, two count over and over again. Chastity, the valet of Credible, takes a BAD Whippersnapper off the top. And Justin gets the tombstone out of nowhere onto the chair for the pin. I hated that ending.

Rating: D+. So in other words, Justin lost twice in a row but he gets a more or less fluke win here and he wins the feud. ECW and most other wrestling companies have a major problem with this and it drives me insane. Just because you win the last match in a feud doesn’t mean you win the feud. Take Dreamer vs. Raven for example: Dreamer “won” the feud, but he lost probably 100 times and got one victory. How does that make him the winner?

As for this match, the ending was just big spot after big spot and then Justin got the tombstone for the random pin. That’s supposed to make sense I guess. Justin, who is supposed to be the best wrestler in the world according to Heyman, did nothing other than a throw into the guard rail all match but hits one big move to win the thing. That’s GREAT wrestling indeed Paul.

Rotten and Mahoney want their shot at the titles. They demand a shot and just get one. Ok then.

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

They still hate each other and even though they don’t get along and fight each other, they manage to beat every team in the company as they do it. Don’t you just love Heyman’s brilliance? Mind you the challengers were in the arena to make their challenge yet the champions are here first. In a funny spot, they argue over who gets top billing. Oh I get it now: the champions came to the ring and were introduced before they actually accepted the challenge. Is Heyman even thinking?

The Freaks are Axl Rotten and Balls Mahoney in case you were wondering. To my surprise we start with a wrestling sequence. Something tells me this isn’t going to last long. Good night Balls Mahoney is worthless. Rotten is trying to wrestle which works ok but it’s hard to take a guy who wrestles for a team called the Hardcore Chair Swingin Freaks seriously. They do a standard tag match here and it’s really not that bad. I’m very surprised. Rotten throws chops and the fans WOO.

They start a BRING IN FLAIR chant and my head begins to hurt. First off, just no. Second off, isn’t that exactly what ECW is supposed to be against? Third of all, I love how they just assume Heyman can afford that. The fans were stupid at times and were dragged around by Heyman by their noses. It’s really pathetic at times. Sunny shows up and the champions fight over Storm saving her. “Hey! You keep your hands off my fiancé! If she dies who cares??? YOU JUST STAY AWAY!”

And now we get to the flat out stupid part of the match. Balls hits his finisher. There’s no one around. They should win the titles. He goes to get a chair. That’s almost understandable I guess. Now let’s have the stupid part. He turns around with the chair in his hand and Storm jumps up with a springboard to come at Mahoney.

What does he do you ask? Does he throw the chair at Storm? Does he, oh I don’t know, MOVE? Nope. He puts the chair in front of his face so Storm can kick it into Balls’ head. That was just pathetic looking. On and Candido hits Storm with the chair so he can get the pin and they fight back to the locker room. This has NEVER been done before!

Rating: C+. Other than the freaking idiotic stuff at the end, this was ok. The key thing: for the most part they kept things toned down and had a wrestling match. Since Barely Legal they’ve toned the violence down a good bit and it’s been helping a lot. This was ok and would have been a lot better had the ending not sucked as much.

Ad for the merchandise catalogue and Heat Wave 98. That one’s coming soon.

We have a “Legends” ceremony from earlier. It’s Junkyard Dog, Dick Slater, Masked Superstar (Ax from Demolition) and Bullet Bob Armstrong. You know, a bunch of old NWA guys, because ECW and the NWA got along SO well. This was a nice idea, but when you look at it this was just stupid.

Shane Douglas, who is apparently held together with tape at this point, is brought out to be told about how tough he is. So despite all these injuries, it’s fairly obvious he’ll win tonight. We’ll get to the pure idiocy of this later. He runs down the WWF and Shawn, who had just left with the broken back that kept him out for four and a half years. Oh and he runs Flair down too. If Shane drew in the entire run of ECW what Flair or Shawn drew in a single year, I’d be stunned.

This is just Shane saying how great he is and how tough he is and how tonight might be his last match. Taz comes out to tease their showdown. Nope, we’ve still got another 8 months before that because the top face vs. the top heel isn’t a match we can have when the fans are begging for it of course. We get what might be the first F Bomb on an ECW PPV. Taz demands the Title be handed to him instead of you know, winning it.

Taz does a weird looking choke out that wasn’t the Tazmission and security breaks it up. Like I said, this match wouldn’t happen for EIGHT MONTHS. What they were waiting on is beyond me. Bigelow comes out to fight Taz and that’s broken up too. They handcuff Taz and arrest him for no logical reason as Shane is spitting up blood. I love how Shane runs down Shawn but he’s going to do the same thing: make this big come from behind win over Snow which makes NO sense but they did it anyway so Shane can look awesome all over again.

Oh dang it we have a New Jack match now.

Bam Bam Bigelow vs. New Jack

GAH IT’S THIS STUPID SONG!!! Seriously, who thought this was a good idea? New Jack is going to get destroyed other than some weapons shots because the guy can’t wrestle a freaking match to save his life but hey, let’s play his song while he’s getting killed. Yep, 30 seconds in and we have weapons. Why is this appealing at all? It’s just mindless violence that has no business being called wrestling.

Bigelow is better than this on so many levels and it’s not even funny. We’re in the crowd now as that song is still playing. Bigelow just throws chairs at him as this is supposed to be entertaining. I get that some fans want this, but it makes the whole company look amateurish as a result. If this was still a regional promotion, this would be just fine. But it’s not a regional company anymore.

They wanted to go national but they can’t let go of the hardcore nonsense and it’s really hurting the product quite a bit. This is going to get at least ten minutes of about three hours. And New Jack jumps off a balcony with a guitar shot to Bigelow’s head. So even though that should likely kill both of them, the fans cheer.

And now let’s just lay around for awhile because that’s a great use of PPV time. Ok to be fair almost all wrestling companies do the laying around thing. Bigelow hits the Greetings From Asbury Park which doesn’t connect at all but whatever. At least it’s over.

Rating: F. I get why it’s here, but it still sucked and was completely worthless. At least we get Welcome to the Jungle. I hate these matches or whatever they are.

We see Dreamer and Sandman getting beaten up by the Dudleys set to a ballad of all things. That was odd.

Dudley Boys vs. Tommy Dreamer/Sandman

Sandman cuts off the always funny Gertner entrance but the song makes up for it a bit. Beaulah is about as close to perfect as you can get. This is another “grudge” match where the grudge was developed between PPVs with no explanation as to what started it or any useless information like that. I get that Sandman’s entrance is cool, but they need to cut a minute or two out of it as it just goes on forever. Yep this is going to be a massive brawl because it’s been a full 4 minutes since we saw one of those.

And there’s the first table and my eyes roll immediately. This of course devolves into a massive brawl that has no semblance of anything noteworthy at all. We get some great shots of Beaulah and that’s about it. Sandman leaves because of his neck and after about five minutes of Tommy being murdered, Spike more or less replaces Sandman.

He gets a 3D for trying to save Beaulah but Sandman comes back in a neck brace. Yeah because he was able to see the doctor and the doctor released him inside of five minutes I guess. A pair of DDTs end this and the Dudleys lose.

Rating: D-. Only reason this isn’t failing is I’ve always thought Beaulah was beyond sexy. This was just ridiculous as Dreamer survived what should have killed him to come back and be fine. It was just a total mess and it wasn’t entertaining for the most part. They had no idea what to do with the Dudleys at this point.

So Sabu had a TV Title shot here tonight against Bigelow and he sent RVD, his partner, in to beat Bigelow up a bit but Van Dam wound up winning the title, leading to this. That’s actually decent.

TV Title: Rob Van Dam vs. Sabu

Something tells me we’re going to have a ton of weapons here and I base that on the fact that it’s a Sabu match. Van Dam gets on the mic after they feel each other out a bit and says this isn’t going to happen and it was a plan. Sabu of course goes after him anyway and makes the speech completely pointless. They actually go four minutes with no weapons. That has to be a record of some kind for Sabu.

We go back to the ring at about 8 minutes in for a change of pace. Oh never mind the chair is there with him. And hey we go back to the floor AGAIN. Joey talks about how brutal it is. I couldn’t agree more. In an impressive spot, Van Dam manages to crotch himself on the guard rail when there’s no guard rail underneath him. Joey: Sabu is deadly at throwing chairs. That can’t be a good sign.

Sabu of course kicks out of the Van Daminator and the Five Star because that’s perfectly reasonable. We’ve been going about half an hour now and I think I know what’s coming. I know this isn’t a lot of text for that long of a match but it’s been about 15 minutes of them just wasting time or laying around or setting up tables and chairs.

There’s been more or less nothing of note here and I’m sure some ECW fan will explain to me that I just don’t get this match and why it’s so great. I’d love one day to watch one of these shows with an ECW fan and hear them try to defend it. Sabu kicks out of the Five Star through a table. Yep that’s perfectly realistic. The move known as Starship Pain gets two and then Sabu gets two and the bell rings for the STUPID time limit draw. They yell at each other for a long time.

Rating: D. There were some interesting drama spots near the end but for the most part this match sucked. There was so much time spent laying around and ridiculous kicking out of moves that it just stopped being interesting. Most of it was on the floor and Sabu of course botched half of what he did. This was ridiculous and the third match in a row that was stupid, and considering the obvious ending coming up, this isn’t going to be a highly received show.

We hear from Shane who reminds us that he’s VERY hurt. We get WAY too long of a recap of Shane’s career and a quick thing from Snow saying he’ll win.

ECW World Title: Al Snow vs. Shane Douglas

So Snow is more or less the hottest thing in the company’s history as everyone likes him and he’s having the best matches of his career. Shane is hurt beyond belief here so to have him win would tick off the audience and completely bury Snow more or less guarantees that Shane will keep the belt here. This starts off like a good showdown match: with both guys being in control for a good while.

This is actually decent stuff with both guys only using a chair. Snow actually kicks out of the belly to belly suplex which anywhere else would be nothing but here it’s a big deal apparently. There’s also no interference for the most part until the locker room empties to watch the match. After a Francine run in, Snow goes up top for a sunset flip which completely misses and Shane drops down for the pin.

The fans go DEAD. I mean they are as quiet as any fans ever have been in ECW history. This was just stupid booking and you can tell Joey thinks so too. This would have been like Austin losing to Michaels at Mania 14.

Rating: D+. And that’s being generous. The problem was that Heyman had booked himself into a corner as he had Taz vs. Shane which he had to build to but Snow was WAY more over than both guys and should have won the title here. However, it had to be about Shane again who no one cared about other than like 8 people. Again, he held the title EIGHT more months after this, FINALLY losing it to Taz in January before leaving a little while later.

The problem was that Snow or Taz should have had the title but by the time they pulled the trigger with Taz the company was in major trouble. Snow was literally on Raw the next night and not seen in ECW again, and why should he have been? He just lost the biggest push of his career and was more or less crippled so that Shane Douglas could get another big push. And people wonder why ECW isn’t around today.

Overall Rating: F. This show was just bad as NOTHING happened here. Seriously, the TV Title match goes to a draw, Heyman’s idiocy eats Al Snow for a solid meal, the Storm/Candido feud is STILL going on and burying a team at a time, Sandman and Dreamer beat the best team in the company despite one being in a neck brace and Credible is apparently cool for beating up a comedy champion.

What was the point here? The Snow thing is just inexcusable, period. It’s stupid stuff like this that caused Heyman to be out of business and he should be considering this crap. Oh and someone PLEASE defend RVD vs. Sabu. I want you to.

Living Dangerously 1998
Date: March 1, 1998
Location: Asbury Park Convention Center, Asbury Park, New Jersey
Attendance: 3,700
Commentator: Joey Styles

It’s been about four to five months since our last outing and only one thing has really changed: Al Snow. He’s risen to prominence now with the Head gimmick and he is having a match tonight with Kronus to showcase himself. Also Storm is feuding with Candido because Storm got thrown out of his spot as a Triple Threat prospect.

 

Jerry Lynn/Chris Chetti vs. F.B.I.

Chetti was the first graduate of the House of Hardcore, the ECW wrestling school, which I know because Joey says that Chris Chetti was the first graduate of the House of Hardcore, the ECW wrestling school. The F.B.I. are all dancing for some reason. This is Guido and Smothers in case you were wondering.

 

Lynn had little credibility at this point but he was getting more popular. Chetti is introduced as the first graduate of the House of Hardcore, the ECW wrestling school. The fans don’t like Smothers, like at all. Maybe Lynn has more credibility at this point than I thought. Ok the WOO for chops is getting annoying.

 

Lynn takes out both guys with a nice looking dive from the top. Rich accidentally nails Chetti. Wait what? That’s what Joey said but it makes no sense. That’s not something I usually have to say about him. He annoys me but to be fair he doesn’t make many huge mistakes. Also to be fair, another guy up there might catch his errors, which are understandable.

 

Chetti hooks a small package but Lynn messes up and has the referee. Again Chris gets the cover on a rollup but there’s no referee. Chetti gets a nice spot where he runs up the corner and comes back with a reverse leg lariat. That was pretty sweet. He finally gets the hot tag to Lynn who cleans house including a jumping back elbow which makes him awesome. Rick comes in with an Italian flag but the shot misses and hits Guido, giving Lynn a rollup for the win.

Rating: C+. Not bad at all. It was pretty fast paced and formula based so everything went fine there. It got the crowd into the show which is never a problem that this place has so that kind of makes these matches redundant. Even still, this was fine.

Joey says Wing Kanemura isn’t here so of course we get a video package anyway on him. He’s not here. Ok then.

Lance Wright, some jerk in a bad suit that says he works for Vince, says that tonight it’s Doug Furnas vs. Tanaka. This guy is really annoying.

Masato Tanaka vs. Doug Furnas

So I watched the whole match before I started writing about it and the only word to describe it is sloppy beyond all belief. I mean they botch a ton of stuff here and it’s not like they’re little spots. They botch BIG spots. Tanaka tries for a tornado DDT but it turns into them just falling all over each other.

 

I guess you can chalk some of this up to them having limited time to prepare, but at the same time these are pros and shouldn’t have to deal with things like this. The fans are booing the heck out of this match and I can’t say for a second that I blame them. It’s just amateurish looking to say the least.

 

A botch here and there is one thing but this is awful. Tanaka ends this nightmare with a roaring elbow. Ok so it wasn’t all botches but still there were FAR too many in here to be acceptable. Post match Wright talks about WWF higher ups and Furnas nails him before putting on an ECW shirt, and I’m assuming defecting or something like that.

Rating: D. The botches just killed it and in a match that doesn’t even go for six minutes that just sucked the life out of this one for me. This just wasn’t worth a PPV time slot but again to be fair they didn’t know that this would be the match. They at least realized the match sucked and ended it before it got out of hand.

Ad for the Hardcore Hotline. Also, you can get a FREE merchandise catalogue. That’s actually smart. Wrestlepalooza, which might be the best name ever, is in two months which is the shortest layoff yet so that’s a good sign.

We can’t air Sandman vs. Sabu because it’s graphic. Keep that in mind.

Nicole Bass, an annoying chick that thought she was a hot Chyna and Jason, an annoying guy, show up and demand that we see a tape. It’s of Dreamer showing up without Beaulah. Yeah that’s it. Tommy has his dog with him. That’s just cool for some reason.

Rob Van Dam vs. 2 Cold Scorpio

Van Dam is still a huge heel here but it’s lightening up a lot. Scorpio is over at least. He’s Flash Funk at this point but here he’s just the simple 2 Cold Scorpio and therefore much better than he was in WWF. The more I hear the more I think Van Dam is already a face. They start with a long feeling out process which is fine as they do some decent technical stuff.

 

However, we of course get a botch because it’s ECW. Those things just suck the life out of a lot of matches. I understand that they are going to happen and at least here they covered it up a bit. In the previous match they just assumed no one noticed and thought it would be fine. That’s just freaking dumb. We get a very nice reversal sequence with a lot of monkey flips that ends with a standoff.

 

Very nice indeed. We hit the floor and Van Dam is in the crowd. Well you knew it was going to happen sooner or later I guess. I think they’re going for the big epic match here but the fans aren’t all happy with it which can’t be a good sign. To be fair though, most of the time not all fans are going to love the thing. The fans want Sandman apparently. That sums up ECW crowds pretty well.

 

We’re given a high flying technically mostly sound match, and the fans want weapons and blood and tables. So many times these fans were just ridiculous and stupid and this is one of them. Scorpio hits a SWEET moonsault. The Five Star which isn’t called that yet gets knees or what are called knees I suppose as it looked like it hit pretty well to me. We hit the ramp for awhile and the Van Daminator is more or less no sold. Hint for how to counter: HIT HIM WITH THE CHAIR. Seriously dude, use some freaking intelligence.

 

A piledriver on the ramp and Van Dam is hurt. And there goes the referee because in a no DQ match we need a referee for…? Van Dam tries to steal the 450 and would have missed completely anyway. Scorpio mostly hits the 450 and here’s Sabu to up the workrate. An Arabian Facebuster gets two. Sandman comes out to chase off Sabu. Van Dam gets a SWEET jumping rollup for the pin. Post match Van Dam acts very cocky and offers a handshake but Scorpio nails him to a big pop.

 

Sabu comes back with a table so they try to put Scorpio through it. Naturally this doesn’t work as Sandman makes the save. In a stupid moment, as Scorpio is laying on it and Sandman makes the save, he pops up as soon as Sandman is here. Yeah that didn’t look dumb at all. Sandman tries a hurricanrana from the top through the table on Sabu. Guess what happens. Go ahead and guess. Anyway, the two faces share a beer after the match. Sandman dances. This is disturbing.

Rating: B-. This was good, but it suffers from the same problem that it always does: Paul Heyman overbooking it. Can ANYONE explain to me why Sabu and Sandman had to come in there? I know RVD and Sabu are partners, but he had no business coming to ringside at all.

 

The match was rather good until they went to the floor and it became just another brawl. Why is wrestling so hard to do when you have two guys that are really good at it? I get that it’s a hardcore company, but at the end of the day it’s a wrestling company and should be about wrestling.

Ok so see if you can follow this one. That’s not me talking, that’s how Heyman starts the next video package. Are you freaking kidding me? The idea is that Storm was a Triple Threat (top heel stable) prospect and won the tag titles with Candido who was in Triple Threat.

 

Sunny showed up and got Candido to go insane and beat up Storm so they’re still champions but hate each other. I didn’t know Russo worked for ECW. Tonight there’s a tag match where they’re on other sides and both get to pick partners. The winners get nothing at all. They would hold the titles another THREE MONTHS before losing them. You think that’s long enough?

Dudley Boys vs. New Jack/Spike Dudley vs. Hardcore Chair Swingin Freaks

It’s elimination rules of course. Gertner’s intro is hilarious for Big Dick Dudley: “The man who last night took such liberties with YOUR mother that he is now legally your father in 17 states.” That is just awesome. About himself: “More tongue in cheek than a lesbian orgy” and “Joel, your girlfriend has me on speed dial because she loves the way I star 69 her, Gertner.” This guy is awesome.

 

He follows that up with “Currently getting jiggy with it to my left,” seriously, sign this guy now. The intro takes like 8 minutes but it’s hilarious. Balls and Axl come out and the brawl is on early. And after some ok stuff here’s New Jack with his weapons to screw the whole thing up. Oh dang it we have to listen to the stupid song again don’t we. Yep we do.

 

The music really throws things off as it keeps making me think that something important is happening or that the team who came out to it are winning. And yep it’s all weapons now. Spike keeps jumping all over the place because that’s the only thing he can do to make sense here. And now all six go into the crowd. Ok then. We’re at the merchandise stand now and Spike and New Jack dive like 15 feet to the floor through tables through the Dudleys.

 

Ok, when Mankind did it, it was cool. This was just mindless violence being substituted for wrestling. Keep in mind that ten minutes into this match the sang song is still playing. An Acid Drop through a table gets two for Spike as Bubba saves it since they want to eliminate Balls and Axl. And a 3D does just that. Twin guitar shots and an Acid Drop and a chair from the top ends this mess.

Rating: D. I hate these things. They’re just complete garbage and more than anything else, I hate that song. Why is this considered interesting or good or anything like that? Anyway, this was just like every other one of these that they did as in it was completely pointless and mindless crap.

We get a big long package about Justin Credible who was pushed to the freaking moon for years. The problem: the fans didn’t care or buy it. Why didn’t they? Simply put: he wasn’t any good. He was average and that’s it.

Justin Credible vs. Tommy Dreamer

Jenna Jameson is the new reporter. Justin Credible comes out and says he has Beaulah so who needs Jenna. I would agree actually. Nicole Bass and Jason are with him and I honestly thought Bass was a man at first. Jenna tries to act tough and it just fails. Dreamer comes out and I have to hear her consistently say Tommy I love you (for those of you that don’t know, that’s my first name).

 

He kisses her and Joey says Dreamer goes where every man has gone before which made me laugh. Dreamer actually hits a plancha as we have a priest in the front row and we keep hearing about how Justin crossed a line. That amuses me to no end. And hey, what a shock, it’s a brawl. AGAIN Joey talks about the Sandman vs. Sabu match that we can’t show. Let it be made clear: WE CANNOT SHOW IT.

 

Yeah just remember that. Dreamer hits a running dropkick to the chair while Justin is in the Tree of Woe. We get kind of a Raven spot as Dreamer gets hit with a drop toehold into a chair. Ok, Justin doesn’t deserve to be WOOED on chops. Neither does Tommy to be fair. They use a chair for about ten spots in a row because that just makes things better or whatever. Dreamer hits a DEATH VALLEY Driver (forget that Spicolli nonsense. He was a drug addict and died after taking too many drugs.

 

He’s not some saint that deserves to be canonized. Let it go already.) which Justin no sells. The spinning, which adds nothing to it that I can see, tombstone hits and here’s Beaulah. She hits Justin low and does the same to Jason before DDTing him. Nicole puts her in a bearhug which she manages to botch.

 

Bass falls out of her top as Mikey Whipwreck, who feuded with Justin but has no bearing here comes in for the save. He has a bad leg and Justin breaks a crutch over his cast before Dreamer hits a DDT for the pin.

Rating: D+. What was the point of this again? I forgot with all the chair shots and nonsensegoing on. This was just more mindless fighting that nothing actually came from. I’m not huge on that as it was just stupid. And I like Tommy.

We get the same ad from earlier for the catalogue and PPV which apparently wasn’t supposed to air then.

Now we get what was supposed to air: Bigelow vs. Taz which was because Bigelow was getting beaten up by Triple Threat so he asked Taz to be his partner to fight them. Taz gets a great line: “I’m not gonna be your partner. I’m gonna be your savior.”

 

Keep in mind that was in his shouting voice. After Taz beats up Shane and says he wants to be world champion (the match didn’t happen for almost another year) Bigelow jumps him and reveals it was all a setup to stop Taz. That makes sense I guess.

TV Title: Taz vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Remember that Bigelow is the hometown boy. I love how they announce Bigelow’s weight and Joey says a different one during the match. That always amuses me for some reason. Bigelow hits a great powerbomb. He was always great at that move. Shame Diesel was using it in WWF so Bigelow couldn’t do it. This is a long brawl but there’s some wrestling in there to balance it out I guess.

 

They hit the crowd for awhile and actually Taz gets some solid cheers. And then Bigelow gets suplexed off the ramp and to the floor and both nearly die. Because that’s clearly the big ratings draw here right? We go back to the ring and Bigelow uses power stuff which Taz gets to suplex his way out of. See, THAT is how Taz looks good: when it’s Shane or some small guy that he’s throwing around it just gets repetitive.

 

The suplexes are leverage moves and now he’s getting to show what he can do with that leverage, making it seem far more important. The tables are brought in as we just have to have those because the wrestling here clearly isn’t good enough. We brawl on the floor AGAIN as I grow to hate Heyman even more. It’s ok to just wrestle in the ring guys. The fans are really restless here as they were popping like cherries for the wrestling stuff.

 

Case in point: Taz takes a sign to the head, fans are dead/booing. They trade punches, crowd cheers. See? It’s not hard to just have wrestling. Tazmission is locked in and Bigelow drops him through the ring. They climb out and Bigelow pulls Taz up for the easy pin. It looked cool and the fans all freaked out over it, but Bigelow couldn’t win with his shoulder piledriver to give us a standard ending? I hate that.

Rating: D+. The brawling was just too much here. This match wanted so badly to be good but the brawling and the tables and the over the top nature of it just killed the stupid thing. Paul just refused to accept the idea of two good wrestlers just getting out there and wrestling and that’s what wound up killing him off in the end. Sometimes the fans just want wrestling and while Paul tried to do that, he went too far most of the time and it killed things.

Heyman runs up and says the Kronus vs. Snow is cancelled and we’re going to see Sandman vs. Sabu from before the PPV, the PPV that the censors said WE CANNOT SEE. Ok, a few questions here. Number one, there was a lot of adult stuff on PPV yet this is inappropriate? Number two, if this is such a hot feud, which it was I guess, why not have this on the PPV?

 

If they were upset that it couldn’t be shown, why would you film it and not air it? Everything else is live, so why wasn’t this? I get in something like UFC where they have the prelim fights taped in case something goes like 10 seconds. That makes sense as it’s a legit concern and if something like that does happen, they have something that they can plug in and give the fans a legit PPV.

 

However, you wouldn’t put St. Pierre in a prelim match that MIGHT make air. This whole thing with Joey constantly saying we can’t air it but there just happens to be full commentary for it anyway makes me shake my head. I guess if you think about it enough it could make sense, but you shouldn’t have to think that hard about it which is the point.

Sabu vs. Sandman

This is dueling canes. Sabu hits the ring second and gives him some fairly weak cane shots. And as Sandman takes over…Sabu runs in for the save? The first guy is RVD in disguise. That’s actually brilliant. Alfonso sends Van Dam to the back despite them destroying Sandman. That makes sense right? Anyway, this is your standard weapons/garbage match because neither can work more than two minutes without them.

 

Wait, where are the canes? I see no canes. Oh that’s right. It’s freaking ECW, meaning there’s no logic at all. It’s just Sabu beating up Sandman for about 10 minutes before Van Dam comes out to help him. There’s just nothing to talk about here at all as it’s terrible. Sabu beats up Sandman some more and the crooked ref of the week comes out to count the pin. This was awful.

Rating: F. What was the point of the canes match or whatever? What was the point of any of this actually? I just don’t get the point here at all as it wasn’t any good and it was just more mindless brawling which seems to be the theme for the show.

Back in the arena, everyone has Styrofoam Heads. Styles yells at Heyman for showing the match that the censors wanted to keep off the air. Apparently they didn’t fix the ring but the main event is happening anyway. Styles says he quits if this happens again with Paul. It’s convincing if you don’t think about it I guess.

Chris Candido/Shane Douglas vs. Lance Storm/???

Two guesses as to who Storm’s partner is given the heads out there. And the partner is Sunny, and you can see the screwjob from here. Storm and Candido do their usual thing which means its cool. Sunny comes in and we don’t have the catfight with Francine. OF COURSE Sunny makes the swerve that no one bought. The fans chant that they want Head.

 

For some reason they give Storm a mic while he’s in a camel clutch and as Candido asks what he’s going to give him, Storm says he’s going to give him head. And yep, Snow comes out. However, for no reason at all, they keep spinning the camera upside down at random intervals. It’s REALLY confusing and annoying. So after about a three minute brawl with Snow’s music playing and Shane falling through the hole in the ring, Snow gets the pin with a Snow Plow. The celebration ends the show.

Rating: N/A. This was way too short and way too over the top to grade. With the camera spinning and the lights going out I couldn’t really keep track of it. Seriously though, this was the main event: a four minute brawl that ends with a quick pin. That sums up everything to me.

Overall Rating: D. There was one title match and a 4 minute main event. How in the heck does this validate a PPV show? This show had the skeleton of a good show there, but it just failed to deliver one. To be fair though, I think it’s because of Heyman more than anything else.

 

He just can’t let things stay the way they should be and it’s killing him. There just doesn’t need to be a chair or a big angle all the time and it weakened the show badly here. I wanted to like this show but I just couldn’t do it. They tried but they were running with an anchor. Only for ECW fans.

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