Happy Wednesday Everyone!
Back with another one of these where I book a show that never happened, in this case the ECW Living Dangerously 2001 event that was originally due to take place on the 11th of March but ended up never happening due to ECW going out of business.
This week I’ll try and build from the Guilty As Charged event in January 2001 in an effort to keep existing storylines moving whilst also creating new ones. ECW doesn’t have the biggest of rosters but we’ll see what I can slap together and we might even bring some fresh faces in.
I’m assuming the reality we’re living in is one where ECW seemingly got another TV deal and thus managed to survive a bit longer. This would have put them in the interesting position of being the defacto second company in America what with WCW soon going southward.
Opening Match
ECW World Tag Team Titles
Champs: Danny Doring and Roadkill Vs The Unholy Alliance of Mikey Whipwreck and Yoshihiro Tajiri w/ The Sinister Minister
15 Minutes
Mikey and Tajiri won a #1 contender match back at Guilty as Charged so they get a shot at the belts here at Living Dangerously. Doring and Roadkill were on a solid roll at the time and Doring had taken on more of a serious persona. Mikey and Tajiri had been the Tag Champions for a day back in 2000 but had never won them back, so we’ll have them finally win them again here, however we’ll have some needle throughout the bout so that neither side is satisfied and we can have some rematches. Mikey and Tajiri can be the more heelish of the two teams.
Match Two
Tony Mamaluke w/ Guido Maritato and Big Sal Vs Nova
10 Minutes
Mamaluke and Guido were a solid tag team act and had previously held the Tag Team Titles, whilst they’d been trying to give Nova a more serious personality following his split with tag partner Chris Chetti. Here we’ll have Mamaluke’s allies try and help him win but Nova will be able to foil the Heels and then pick up the win. Post-match Big Sal will castigate Mamaluke for losing, even though Sal missing an attack will have played a major part in causing Mamaluke to lose in the first place. Mamaluke will stand up for himself and Sal will clock him, leading to Guido backing up his partner and getting attacked as well. Mamaluke and Guido will eventually manage to evade Sal, leading to Sal promising that he will bring in a team for them to wrestle so that he can get even. Guido had been a Heel for a long time at this stage so this should hopefully freshen him up and Mamaluke will likely be a good face in peril due to his penchant for selling.
Match Three
Simon Diamond and Johnny Swinger w/ Dawn Marie Vs CW Anderson and Tommy Dreamer
15 Minutes
Dreamer managed to defeat CW in an I Quit match back at Guilty As Charged, leading to CW showing the veteran some respect for a good fight by agreeing to a post-match handshake. Simon and Swinger, Anderson’s allies, are both Heels and will be disgusted by this show of respect and will challenge Dreamer to a tag match so they can send him out of ECW forever. Dreamer will turn to Anderson as a partner, who will accept. However, the build will be all about whether Dreamer can actually trust his new partner or not. Anderson will be conflicted for parts of the bout but eventually he’ll come good and will be there for Dreamer when he needs him, leading to Anderson and Dreamer picking up the win. Dreamer allies Christian York and Joey Matthews will still be distrustful of Anderson though and won’t like Dreamer befriending a former foe like this, sowing the seeds for some dissension down the line between Dreamer and his young protégés.
Match Four
EZ Money w/ Julio Dinero, Chris Hamrick and Elektra Vs Little Spike Dudley w/ Balls Mahoney and Chilly Willy
10 Minutes
Money and his allies have had an issue with Spike since the autumn of 2000, so we’ll finally get a big pay per view match in order to settle things, with Spike bringing the team of Meat and Two Veg with him in order to back him up. Eventually all kinds of chaos will take place at ringside, leading to Money picking up a tainted win, with Hamrick being integral to Spike losing. This won’t be the end of this issue though.
Match Five
Da Baldies (Spanish Angel and Tony DeVito) Vs The New Impact Players (Justin Credible and Steve Corino) w/ Francine and Jack Victory
15 Minutes
Credible and Corino were seemingly thrown together out of nowhere at Guilty As Charged but we’ll try them as a unit to see if we can make it work. Da Baldies and New Impact Players brawled to the back on that January event, so we’ll do the logical pay per view match to keep things going. Da Baldies were actually a solid team thanks to DeVito being a good hand and Angel having an imposing look, so we’ll let them get plenty of offence here on route to a battling defeat. However, following the match we’ll give the group a new member when Homicide runs out of the crowd and assists in a Heel beat down. Homicide was in Jersey All Pro at the time and would actually team with Angel for that outfit once ECW closed, so he should be a believable member of a street gang and it’s not like Homicide fighting with Steve Corino in some form will be boring.
Semi-Main
Jerry Lynn w/ Cyrus Vs Super Crazy
15 Minutes
This is an effort to elevate Crazy in the singles ranks because he was over and it was worth trying him in the upper-card if only to see if he could sustain that overness in that position. Lynn had recently turned Heel and was doing a cocky whiner styled gimmick, so we’ll give him something further to whinge about here with Crazy picking up the big win. Lynn and Crazy can always wrestle again down the line but right now Crazy needs the boost from a big win so we’ll roll the dice on him and see what happens with it.
Main Event
Unified ECW World Title
Champ: Rhino w/ Cyrus Vs The Sandman Vs Rob Van Dam
15 Minutes
Rhino defeated Sandman for the World Title at Guilty As Charged and then ducked out of a chance to wrestle Rob Van Dam, so here Sandman will get his rematch and RVD will also get a shot at the Title. In typical ECW fashion it will be an elimination match, with RVD shockingly being the first to be eliminated when Sabu will make his ECW return in order to cause RVD’s elimination. This will leave Rhino and Sandman to go at it with Rhino eventually putting Sandman away with his trademark piledriver. Rhino will try a post-match attack but Super Crazy will make the save in order to really try an capitalise on his earlier big win by having him be the rescuer to one of ECW’s top names. Sandman and Crazy can drink a beer to close the show whilst Rhino seethes.
In Conclusion
The Hardcore Heaven pay per view in May based off what we got here would probably look like this;
- Rhino defending the World Title against Super Crazy. Crazy doesn’t have to win, but it’s a Main Event match and if he gives a good account of himself then he should gain something from it, even in defeat.
- Doring and Roadkill attempting to win their belts back from Mikey and Tajiri. I don’t think the new Champs should lose them back after only just winning them so we’d need some kind of a disputed finish here if we want the feud to continue. Mikey and Tajiri could even go full Heel by throwing fire or something in order to pick up the win?
- Rob Van Dam looking for revenge on Sabu. I think we either need to give RVD the win in order to get him back on the Title path or we’d need some kind of a finish that would stretch the feud out a bit longer. Sabu hadn’t beaten RVD on pay per view yet so this could be his first time to do so, leading to RVD eventually coming back to win a big gimmick bout before going after Rhino again. Obviously we don’t want to draw out RVD’s eventual Title win, as getting the belt on him is ultimately the best move, but Rhino should have the chance for a proper reign first I feel and Sabu is a good placeholder feud for RVD until it’s time for him to finally win the big one.
- Da Baldies taking on The New Impact Players and a partner. My initial thought here is that we go with New Jack as the partner, because he hates Da Baldies and it makes sense, but we could always go in another direction with it. We could even freshen up New Jack with a Heel turn and have him join Da Baldies as their new leader, which would give them some much needed credibility if nothing else. I think the way to do it would be for Corino and Credible to get worked over in a 3 on 2 situation for most of the match until New Jack’s music hits for the big pop, and either you turn it into a tornado styled weapons match with New Jack as a babyface or you have New Jack immediately turn on the babyfaces leading to the Heels picking up the win.
- Chris Hamrick Vs Little Spike Dudley as a result of Hamrick being involved in Spike’s loss at Living Dangerously. Spike can get a win to give the crowd something to be happy about as we’re looking at having quite a few Heels wins on this show and I don’t want the event to be too much of a downer.
- The FBI taking on Big Sal’s new mystery team. I’m thinking possibly Monsta Mack and Dan Maff as I think they were already teaming on the indies by this point and it would be an impressive imposing looking team for Sal to show up with. Whoever the team is they’d need to win the first match in order to give them credibility and also give the new babyface FBI a mountain to climb.
- Tommy Dreamer taking on Joey Matthews as the relationship between Dreamer and his two young protégés York and Matthews continues to falter. Dreamer can either win and Matthews can get even more indignant that he couldn’t defeat the mentor, or Matthews can cheat to win somehow and York will then have to either go along with it or push back, with either being a potentially interesting storyline direction.
- EZ Money and Julio Dinero doing battle with Balls Mahoney and Chilly Willy. Meat and Two Veg can win here, especially as we’re giving some Heel teams wins later on in the card and we’ll need some babyface opponents for them.
I hope you enjoyed this and that it made sense somewhat. If you guys like it then I can always pick up the thread again down the line. I think next week we’ll do something different from re/booking. It’s been over 20 years since Monday Night Raw started, so I think I’ll countdown some of my own personal favourite Raw moments. We’ll do that for a couple of weeks and then possibly return to booking themed articles or maybe even some wrestling reviews on Wednesdays again. Hopefully I’ll see you all next week!