FROM THE DESK OF....6 by Greg Prowse
On February 23 of this year, ECW on Sci-Fi was replaced by NXT, a "next generation" programme pitting eight rookies in their quest to immortalise themselves in WWE. More significant for me however, was the cancellation of ECW. As the third brand of World Wrestling Entertainment, ECW was resurrected on June 13, 2006, after sales of a Rise and Fall of ECW DVD went through the roof, and a tribute pay per view called One Night Stand in 2005 that was well received. No doubt bouyed by this uncovered gold mine, Vince relaunched ECW fulltime, much to the chagrin of this writer, and many hardcore fans, who had passionately watched them as the original anti-establishment organisation, which helped ressurect with their concepts a flagging pro wrestling scene in the early to mid 90s. Even before the mid-noughties, ECW and the then-WWF entered into a working agreement, which resulted in talent appearing on RAW briefly - Vince also allowing ECW TV time to plug their initial pay per views. (This would lead to a brilliant inter-promotional angle of which is explained later in the column).
In 2001, as WWF's burial of WCW and lack of talent hampered their planned invasion angle, Heyman and Co., came to the rescue, which culminated in the returns of Tommy Dreamer and Rob Van Dam. Hardcore fans were no doubt optimistic when the news of ECW returning was made. While it's doubtful they liked seeing Vince McMahon in charge, One Night Stand in 2005 was universally considered one of their top pay per view efforts of that year. The show was largely in part booked by Paul Heyman, the original owner, and this was evident from Heyman's shoot laden promo directed at WWE wrestlers - who were planted on the balconies of Hammerstein Ballroom - and RVD's unscripted promo about being held down in WWE. Whilst some of the big money matches failed to deliver, possibly due to expectations and father-time - Benoit/Guerrero and Rey/Psicosis were disappointments - the event was still one of WWE's best efforts of the year, and at a bargain basement cost. Masato Tanaka and Mike Awesome lit up the crowd with their usual match formula - Awesome was initially heavily booed by the New York crowd, dating back to when Awesome walked out of the company in 2000 while still the World Heavyweight champion. Lance Storm wrestled what he thought at the time was his last match against old training buddy Chris Jericho in a fine match.
The show concluded with a trademark ECW brawl pitting the Dudley Boys (Buh Buh Ray and Devon) against Tommy Dreamer and The Sandman, which led to a rumble between ECW and RAW/Smackdown wrestlers who were in the crowd. Eric Bischoff took a bunch of finishers and was then transported into a dumpster outside the building. (It was during the melee between ECW and RAW/SD that The Blue Meanie was infamously bloodied by JBL). However, when ECW debuted on Sci-Fi, hardcore fans were shocked at what they saw. Evidently, Heyman was no longer the head honcho making the decisions. Due to the nature of their network, Sci-Fi thought it would be a great idea to have zombies and vampires make appearances on the show. Kurt Angle defeated former World Heavyweight champion Justin Credible in under two minutes. As the weeks followed, the uniqueness of the ECW brand was slowly taken away, where it became just another WWE brand. ECW was then combined with Smackdown tapings and thus taken out of their traditional haunts. It didn't help when RVD and Sabu were caught by police in a car with marijuana, resulting in RVD quickly dropping the dual WWE and ECW World Heavyweight titles. Chris Benoit - who was slated to wrestle on the ECW brand - tragically murdered his family, and then commited suicide. After the disasterous December to Dismember pay per view, Heyman left the company. As time went on, the show improved, albeit no longer having any real ties to the original besides having the initials. It created a platform for stars like John Morrison and The Miz, but it also became a haven for wrestlers that couldnt get a spot on RAW and Smackdown. Essentially, ECW became as much a dumping ground as a brand that was capable of building new stars. The first time I was exposed to ECW was back in high school. My uncle came across a compilation tape of Cactus Jack in ECW, and being that it was wrestling, I was intrigued.
At that point, I believe I only knew about WWF and WCW. I had remembered seeing Cactus when either Channel 9 or 10 would sporadically air WCW programming. The last I'd seen of Mr. Jack, he was embroiled in a feud with the monsterous Big Van Vader. As I came to learn later on, WCW didn't have any high hopes on Mick Foley becoming a household name, and they basically shipped him off to ECW, into the loving arms of Paul Heyman. His first ECW match was an "interpromotional dream match" against Sabu. Prior to this, I had no idea who Sabu was. Only a man as crazy as Sabu could steal the spotlight from someone elses compilation tape. Looking back, their brawl doesn't hold up, and even at the time, it was probably a bit underdone. Cactus was going in with a bad shoulder, and the hype was clearly too much. Nevertheless, I was hooked on the company. A combination of Sabu's death-defying aerial moves and Cactus' head splitting chairshot to the massive 911 was enough for me. Much of the early ECW I saw depended on brutality. One of the bloodiest feuds I can recall seeing was between "brothers" Ian and Axl Rotten. To me, these two put the extreme in Extreme Championship Wrestling. While they wern't the first to swing a chair in the company, they brought that real R-rated violence to the company by way of glass, barbed wire and baseball bats. They were so vicious, that according to both Ian and Axl, they were admonished by hardcore legend Terry Funk. Ian and Axl had made up the team Bad Breed, but for some reason, didn't seem to be used properly despite their size.
They went on to lose a match to The Pitbulls, where the stipulation stated they could never team again. This was the gateway to a violent feud instigated by Ian, and led to such hardcore classics as the TaiPei Deathmatch - where both men glued shards of glass to their fists - and their gory Barbed Wire Basebat Bat match. As much as ECW was gory, their storylines were compelling. The on-going saga between Raven and Tommy Dreamer is surely the perfect textbook for anybody wanting to know how to keep a feud fresh over a long period of time. From their first encounter at the Return of the Funker show on February 4, 1995, right up to 2000, these two had a simmering rivalry. What was most unique was that up until Wrestlepalooza 1997, Dreamer never beat Raven. Each time Dreamer was thwarted by Raven and his "Nest." To keep the rivalry going, other wrestlers were intertwined - Stevie Richards, Luna Vachon, The Pitbulls, Francine, Beulah and the Dudleys to name a few. In many ways I feel ECW never fully got credit for producing some of the most rivetting storylines in wrestling. One of the best inter-promotional angles I've seen in wrestling involved ECW. As mentioned earlier in the column, WWF invited ECW wrestlers to compete - albeit briefly - on their flagship programme, RAW. This was in the middle of WWF's bitter struggle with WCW in the Monday night ratings, and encouraged by ECW's uprising as an underground, cutting edge wrestling company, several ECW wrestlers competed against each other, with Heyman in full hype mode on colour commentary. It was during these exchanges that Jerry Lawler - whom Heyman once worked for when Lawler was part owner of the Memphis territory - that the seeds were planted for a major feud involving ECW and Lawler.
The King's comments cut to the bone of ECW fans by labeling the promotion "Extremely Crappy Wrestling," and a comment about Taz's short stature caused a scene at ringside. Lawler also, in a shoot-like fashion, wondered why on Earth Vince was allowing ECW TV time to plug their pay per views. However, the war didn't end up being between ECW and WWF. Instead, it was ECW against Lawler's Memphis promotion, the United States Wrestling Association. Lawler challenged ECW to oppose him and his views, and the call was answered by the Innovator of Violence, Dreamer. Dreamer had no time to celebrate his long-awaited victory over Raven, before he was viciously attacked by RVD, Sabu and Lawler. Lawler's appearance in the ECW Arena illicited the most heat I think the company ever experienced. This feud played out on ECW and USWA television, with many heat-filled moments - long time ECW opponent Jim Cornette legitimately injuring Dreamer's testicles with his tennis racquet - and Dreamer tearing up the USWA TV studio. Another myth about ECW was that it was all garbage wrestling. In 1995, ECW had names such as Benoit, Dean Malenko, 2 Cold Scorpio and Eddy Guerrero; they also ushered in mainstream wrestling's fascination with Mexican lucha libre, when Heyman imported masked marvels such as Rey Misterio Jr., Psicosis and Juventud Guerrera. Rey and Psicosis produced spectacular, ground-breaking matches, as did Rey and Juventud.
The time limit draw over the ECW TV title between Guerrero and Malenko still holds up today as a classic. A hidden gem was also Benoit and a pre-Head Al Snow, who put on a wrestling clinic. Yoshihiro Tajiri and Super Crazy engaged in a series of tremendous hybrid-style matches throughout 1999, and RVD and Jerry Lynn's budding rivalry produced some pearlers. While not exactly pure wrestling, Masato Tanaka and Mike Awesome's imported feud from Japan's FMW promotion wowed audiences. In early 2001, ECW - and also WCW - would fold. It was the end of a dream run for wrestling fans, who had three viable companies suddenly turn into one big WWF monopoly. It was the changing of the landscape by a renegade band of wrestlers, and the genius vision of Heyman - and earlier Tod Gordon - which is the ECW I will remember. Many of the names started out in obscurity, or were not known by mainstream fans.Yet it all gelled at a time when the wrestling business was crying for something.
Whilst ECW may have just recently vanished in the eyes of most fans, for me it ended in 2001.
