The SmarK Rant for ECW Wrestling on TNN – 12.10.99

The SmarK Rant for ECW Wrestling on TNN – 12.10.99

Man, I haven’t watched one of these in a while.

We pick things up in the cold open with Sabu trying to dive off a balcony with a broken leg, and RVD taunts him from the ring, calling him “the Sheik’s SECOND favorite wrestler”, and of course Sabu jumps off and puts himself through a table anyway. And then we cut back to the dressing room, where Raven is apparently having an episode while Tommy Dreamer tries to calm him down. I know I harp on this every time I watch these shows but they spent SO MUCH TIME on that Raven and Dreamer storyline in 99 and it went absolutely nowhere.

Taped from Atlanta, GA

Your hosts are Joey Styles & Joel “Forget everything that you know about Santa, ‘cuz I’m the jolly man who gets the ho ho ho’s in Atlanta” Gertner. Joey notes that they’re in “enemy territory” and I had to think about it for a second before remembering that WCW was still around in 1999.

Meanwhile, Steve Corino crashes a Limp Bizkit concert and people in 1999 are actually upset that they don’t get to hear Limp Bizkit playing. 1999 was a weird time.

Steve Corino joins us, and he hates the “hardcore music” scene, instead putting over Backstreet Boys and Britney Spears. This was a heat getting thing to say in 1999, but they’re both touring and making millions of dollars to this day and who the hell knows what Fred Durst is doing these days, and honestly who cares? Corino carries on and talks about Dusty Rhodes, who is hanging out backstage tonight, and thanks Dusty for inspiring the fans tonight, even though 90% of them are drunk. Then he quips that Dusty “left his spine in the last town he killed”, which brings Dusty down to have words with Corino. Steve has apparently beaten up everyone in the locker room over the past year and isn’t afraid of “an old fossil” who still thinks it’s 1985. Corino cuts him off and won’t let him cut a promo, and that’s the worst thing you can do to Dusty, so he attacks and lays out Corino and Jack Victory with bionic elbows before dropping the big elbow on Steve as we take a break.

Joey recaps the stuff that was taped for Hardcore TV. Thankfully, whereas WCW’s old domain is owned by malware squatters, ECWWrestling.com is basically an archived third party history of the company with links to WWE Network and stuff and appears totally safe to visit. So that’s good.

Meanwhile, the Impact Players do their wacky catchphrase in advance of Justin facing Sandman tonight.

Spike Dudley v. Uganda

I presume Uganda is Kamala II / Botswana Beast. Basically a guy for them to bring in and feed the Giant Killer gimmick. And Spike finishes with the Acid Drop at 0:20 as you’d expect.

Meanwhile, RVD never liked sharing the spotlight with Sabu and never liked him as a tag team partner either, but he knows Sabu will keep coming back because he’s too stupid to quit. Which is why Rob is the Sheik’s favorite wrestler.

ECW World title: Mike Awesome v. 2 Cold Scorpio

Scorpio was just kind of cruising the indies after leaving the WWF and was last seen on Heroes of Wrestling before this. Scorp grabs a headlock and superkicks Awesome to the ramp, then follows with a dive and moonsaults him out there. Back in, Awesome catches him on a bodypress attempt and suplexes him over the top rope as they head out and brawl on the floor. Awesome backdrops him into the front row and follows with a flying clothesline over the railing. Awesome beats on him with a wooden chair and they head back into the ring, where Awesome comes off the top and punches the chair back into Scorpio’s face for two. Scorpio tries a comeback and Awesome cuts him off with a lariat, with Scorpio taking a 360 bump off that. Scorpio rolls him up for two and fights back with a superkick and flying splash for two. Scorpio goes up with a moonsault for two, but he tries a leg lariat and Awesome catches him and slams him. German suplex sends Scorpio flying back into the corner. Too bad we never got Awesome v. Brock Lesnar because that would have been fun. Awesome sets up a table and Jazz runs in and tries to save Scorpio, which allows Scorp to hit a high cross for two with Jazz helping to hold Awesome down. Scorpio puts him on the table, but spend too much time doing his hand signal thing and Awesome cuts him off on the top rope and powerbombs his ass through the table from the top rope, and pins him to retain at 9:22. Excellent TV match, especially by the standards of the usual backyard-level scrubs who clog up these crappy ECW shows. **** Case in point…

The Sandman v. Justin Credible

Jason has stolen the Singapore cane from the dressing room, so Sandman brings a broom with him instead. Also Justin’s promo before the match sounds like someone trying to rip off HHH, but HHH from 3 years after this, so I guess you could accuse HHH of ripping off Justin. Sandman gets some shots on Justin but then goes and messes around with a ladder outside and takes forever, which allows Justin to lay him out and put the ladder in the corner. Sandman drops him on the ladder for two and then puts the ladder on him and legdrops it for two. That looked bad. Then Sandman brings a table into the ring, but he can barely get it over the top rope without dropping it on himself. Guys, I think Sandman might not be entirely sober here. Just a hunch. Justin cuts him off with a sleeper, but Rhino runs in and spears them both through the table before leaving again. Jason brings the cane into the ring and Sandman steals it and takes him out, but Lance Storm also does a run-in and hits Sandman with a missile dropkick, putting Justin on top for the pin at 6:20. And then we get the usual crap to end the show, with Francine and Dawn Marie and Tommy Dreamer all running in and everyone fighting, until the Impact Players of course destroy everyone and do their stupid catchphrase. DUD

Meanwhile, Tommy confronts Raven in the back, wondering why he didn’t help. HE’S CALLING HIM “SCOTTY”! IT’S A SHOOT! Raven notes that he’s in so much pain that he can barely hurt himself, and also he doesn’t want to help Sandman. Fair enough, I wouldn’t want to help Sandman either.

This was a pretty entertaining show by the low standards of ECW on TNN and I enjoyed it a lot more than what they had putting out to date. Too bad more of them couldn’t have been like this.