November 1997 - Monaco, PA
Tommy Rogers vs. Chris Candido is our opening match and the crowd is not super enthused about how it starts. By 97', Rogers had been wrestling for close to 20 years, but looks pretty, well, fantastic (he was in a team called The Fantastics with Bobby Fulton in the 80s). Despite having a lengthy and varied career, Rogers and Fulton never had the big run in the right place at the right time so, by 97', the average fan probably had no clue who he was. Candido was more famous as he'd been in the WWE (as "Bodydonna" Skip, with his real life fiance Sunny as his manager), but was a much more serious character in ECW. Still, this style of match, in front of this crowd, earns chants of "Boring" because they dare to actually show the audience some scientific wrestling and build to the big spots (which aren't nearly as "big" as the type of stuff Sabu, RVD, and Whipwreck were doing). Anyway...they do win the crowd over as they build to what fans seemed to believe was going to be the finish, but Candido's buddy Lance Storm shows up and then Jerry Lynn appears and the match becomes a tag match. I guess that trope wasn't invented by the WWE in the mid-00s? The crowd doesn't seem super enthused, but the action does become a bit wilder once Lynn and Storm join in. At one point, Tommy Rogers hits the "Tomakaze," which I had no idea he invented (?) as I always thought it was something Christian came up it (its his Unprettier/Killswitch finisher). This started out a bit slow, picked up nicely, and then peaked well once it became a tag match. Not a bad opener. (2.5/5)
If anyone could pull a good-to-great match out of Justin Credible, one of the blandest workers in ECW and maybe all of 90s/00s wrestling history, it should've been Mikey Whipwreck. Whipwreck is a guy that I had not seen much of before I got the Network and began seeing his brief run in WCW and then some of his bigger matches in ECW. I know ECW diehards respect his resume, but I'd still consider him pretty underrated. Whipwreck played an undersized underdog, but he could absolutely go and was so quick and wild that the ECW cameras often missed his craziest moves (which they do here, twice). Credible was a heel so, in ECW, that often meant working a slow, methodical pace to get heat from the fans (who came to see blood, craziness, wild brawls, scantily clad women, etc.). Of course, good heels - like Candido and Storm, in the opener - were often able to work that "anti-ECW" style in the opening minutes but then spice it up just enough to keep the audience engaged and build to the more typical "extreme" style. Justin Credible was not that good yet and I'm not sure he ever got that good. When Whipwreck rallies, there's fun to be had, but this isn't his best showing either (some say injuries were already taking their toll despite him being only 24 when this match happened, but I'm not 100% sure that was the case). I liked the upset finish, but this was a disappointment. (1.5/5)
Backstage, Al Snow is talking to Head. Before the next match, Joey Styles mentions a video package going through the Sabu/Sandman rivalry, but the video is edited out of the Network version. Maybe because of licensing whatever song they used? Or was it because it shows Sabu throwing a fireball into Sandman's face?
Back in the ring, Pitbull #2 challenges Tazz for the ECW Television Championship. Tazz was mega-over. Pitbull #2 hits him with a powerbomb early, but Tazz fights back, hits a pair of suplexes and then wins via his Katahajime (Tazzmission) in something like 90 seconds. I'm not sure what the story was here that would lead to Pitbull #2 getting absolutely buried, but they did leave the company shortly after so I'm guessing it was a conflict with Paul E. This is the sort of match that Tazz's haters would point to as proof that he was a guy that bought into his own hype because he acts like a total bad ass, but actually was 5'9'' and maybe 220 and was only booked like a shooter. After the match, Tazz takes out the other Pitbull and then cuts an X-rated promo about Brakkus, a WWE talent who was there as part of a pro-WWE stable led by manager Lance Wright. Yes, in case you were wondering, ECW was running two separate (but sometimes joined) pro-WWE groups in late 97'. Its hard to call this a good match, but it was an entire 5-minute segment so its worth a couple points. (2/5)
The ECW Tag Team Championships are on the line next as The FBI (Little Guido and Tracy Smothers w/ Tommy Rich) defend the titles in a 4-way dance featuring The Dudleys, Balls Mahoney and Axl Rotten, and New Jack and Kronus. This is about as "classic ECW" as one match can get, though I'll admit that saying so is ignoring some of the better innovations that ECW should get credit for. But in most people's minds, this sort of match does exemplify the ECW spirit: its a tag match but some teams feature two members and some three or more, its a tag match but nobody is bothering with actual tags for most of it, New Jack and Kronus don't show up for the first 5+ minutes (at which point, New Jack's entrance theme plays until their elimination), the whole match is violent and chaotic but there's no real "story" or escalation - its just craziness from start to finish, despite the match featuring close to a dozen wrestlers, there are probably less than a dozen actual wrestling moves performed in its entire 15 minute runtime. That's not to say there weren't some highlights, though, as the match kicked off with a classic Joel Gertner promo, Bubba hit an awesome splash to the outside at one point, we saw a cheese grater get used, New Jack smashed a guitar over someone's head (I forget who), Kronus hit his 450, the Dudleys' elimination is fun and gets a brilliant reaction (Bubba accidentally hits D-Von with the 3D due to Gertner's interference), and when things do settle down to Rotten and Mahoney vs. The FBI, we get some interesting storyline development as referee Jeff Jones turns heel by refusing to make the count for Balls and Axl. Its a screwy finish, but this match ending "cleanly" would almost seem inappropriate. This is "kitchen sink" ECW and while it likely wouldn't work nearly as well in most other US promotions (especially in the 90s), in this environment, the crowd digs it. (3/5)
Backstage, Tommy Dreamer arrives with Beulah McGillicutty in tow and talks about his upcoming match against Rob Van Dam. This feud was all about Dreamer representing ECW and Rob Van Dam being "Mr. Monday Night" and being aligned with the WWE...even though, as far as I know, he wasn't actually getting paid by Vince McMahon (though, maybe he was in a roundabout way as Vince was providing Heyman something like 50k a month at some point?). Regardless, Dreamer is not one of my favorites, but his best work was clearly in his ECW years. Van Dam would have much better matches with much more agile opponents, but this match had something that some of those didn't - true heat. The crowd absolutely hates Rob Van Dam here, which is kinda silly because its so clear he was an ECW guy (even if the character he was playing meant he had to claim otherwise). I like Dreamer's selling early and Rob Van Dam focusing on Tommy's injured foot - its a rare moment of actual ring psychology on a show that mostly ignores that kind of thing. That sort of attention to detail and - dare I say - restraint goes out the window soon after, though, as the match becomes a somewhat interesting but imperfect clash of styles between Dreamer's brawling and RVD's high-flying and "spot-fest" antics. There are moments when the two styles come together to create something unexpected, such as when Dreamer stops RVD from hitting his split-legged moonsault by kicking him in the balls or the way they tease, counter, but then eventually deliver Van Daminators to eachother, but there's also a repetitiveness and lack of real suspense or escalation that makes things feel disjointed and inorganic as they move work from spot to spot. Things really go off the rails when Stevie Richards shows up (he had been working in WCW) and then Furnas and LaFon (who were WWE guys) show up and then evil ref Jeff Jones gets involved for the second time of the night. It becomes a complete clusterfuck and the thread holding things together - that this is a "flag match" pitting an ECW avatar vs. a WWE avatar - is completely lost as we get too many unrelated side plots and mini-feuds cluttering up the story. As someone unfamiliar with each storyline, my ignorance is likely the key reason for my confusion...but reading other people's reviews, I'm not alone in thinking that what could've been a fairly straight-forward match ends up suffering from overbooking. Oh, and Sabu showed up in the end too, to lead to the next match... (2/5)
Sabu vs. The Sandman in a Tables and Ladders (and, as Joey Styles points out, chairs too) match. Like the tag team match but longer and somehow with even more nonsense and less selling, this match is notorious in some corners of the internet as the worst match in ECW history. The funny thing is, I could just as easily see the argument that this is somehow one of the best matches in ECW history. The match goes too long. The selling is... "inconsistent" (to be nice). There is no escalation or raising of the stakes as Sabu and Sandman essentially perform the same series of big crazy spots ad nauseam. But keep that part in mind: they're performing almost non-stop crazy spots, both men recklessly throwing themselves, ladders, and chairs all over the place. It is a violent, bloody match where things go wrong just as often as they go "right." It is as sloppy a match as any that had ever happened on PPV and there's something very true to the ECW aesthetic about that. Sometimes the "botches" in this match make it better - for example, at one point Sandman gets struck with the edge of a falling ladder and it leaves him with a terrible gash on his head, and, from that point on, he has no choice but to "sell" the damage because, well, there's no way not to sell that damage. The same eventually happens to Sabu as the "Homicidal, Genocidal One" becomes naturally fatigued by the sheer number of tables he's put himself and his opponent through. This match's 20-minute runtime feels like twice as long not because it is slow and boring, but because it is a war of nothing but hardcore wrestling. There's no preamble. There's no feigning that they might actually perform a legit wrestling move (though, there are a couple thrown in there, one of which - an Electric Chair by Sandman that sends Sabu crashing into the mat - is devastating to watch). It is what it is and while I wouldn't call it great, I'm not sure it deserves the reputation it has and may even be remembered better if the fireball spot towards the end hadn't been a misfire and they'd have been able to come up with a more clever way to finish things. (2.5/5)
Main event time - Shane Douglas challening Bam Bam Bigelow for the ECW World Heavyweight Championship. This show is coming from Douglas' hometown, so he's the babyface even though he was technically a heel. Bigelow absolutely dominates him and Douglas spends the majority of the time bumping and selling for the champion. I love Francine - whose on crutches - also doing her best version of Miss Elizabeth (the worried valet) but still coming across a bit more like Sensational Sherri due to her shrill screaming. The crowd is fully behind Douglas and his babyface performance isn't terrible, but this match didn't hold my attention and the finish felt a bit out of nowhere and unearned (as Bigelow had dominated so much of the bout) after literally 20+ minutes of Douglas only getting the occasional hope spot - most of which Bigelow shrugs off. Not a match I'd ever want to revisit. (1.5/5)
With a Kwang Score of 2.14-out-of-5, you won't find anything close to a classic on this show, but there are some moments to enjoy and only the main event and the uninteresting Credible/Whipwreck match are real disappointments. Everything else is middling-to-average (with the wild tag match standing out as the clear Match of the Night) but not too far off what one might to expect. Lots of critics have called the Sandman/Sabu match an abomination and one of the worst matches in PPV history, but part of me feels like it is such a trainwreck it might actually deserve a few more points - the rare instance of a match so bad, it's good. Overall, though, if you're seeking out the best of what ECW had to offer, I'd look almost anywhere else.
FINAL RATING - High Risk Maneuver
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