Mike Reviews ECW Hardcore TV #202 (Lee & Raven Vs Funk & Dreamer)

Happy Extreme Friday Everyone!

We’re back with some more ECW Hardcore TV today, as we head back to March 1997 for a show where we’ve got some matches from CyberSlam 1997, as well as some interview segments that didn’t make it to the main show. I haven’t seen the assorted stuff around the matches before, so let’s make some non-money from old rope.

You can view the full card below;

ECW Hardcore TV #202 Card

Hardcore TV is emanating from The Arena in Philly on the 22nd of February 1997 and aired on the 6th of March 1997

Calling the action is Joey Styles

“Bulldozer” Brian Lee and ECW World Champ Raven Vs Terry Funk and “The Innovator of Violence” Tommy Dreamer w/ Beulah McGillicutty

Brian Lee had been brought in originally as a hired gun for Raven during his feud with Dreamer, which saw Lee and Dreamer compete in numerous brutal matches. Funk was having yet another “one last run” in a series of them, with it eventually leading to him winning the ECW Title at ECW’s inaugural pay per view event.

The story here is that if Funk can pin Raven then he gets a shot at Barely Legal, so Raven lays down and goads Dreamer to pin him in order to cost Funk the Title shot. Dreamer refuses though and starts beating Raven up. Raven was superb on the mic there, being the biggest jerk in the building in trying to tempt Dreamer to take the easy pin after years of not being able to beat Raven.

There is a great spot where Dreamer gets the DDT on Raven and then tags out to Funk, leading to Funk getting a series of pin attempts on Raven whilst Raven desperately tries to escape the ring and tag back out to Lee. They worked that great and really got across the desperation of both wrestlers perfectly. Raven continues to avoid getting in whenever Funk is legal in an effort to avoid getting pinned by The Funkster.

The fight eventually spills out to the floor, leading to all four wrestlers fighting in the crowd. It’s the usual wild anarchic ECW action, and it’s good fun for the most part. Raven is soon bleeding and locked in Funk’s spinning toe-hold in the middle of the ring. Raven actually taps out but the referee is distracted by Lee and Dreamer brawling outside of the ring and misses it, meaning Lee can then break up the hold with some metal bin attacks.

Lee destroys Funk with the bin, with the idea being that he’s threatening Funk’s career with such a brutal attack. Dreamer crawls back into the ring in an effort to rescue his mentor, but he is unsuccessful and both babyfaces end up getting destroyed by Lee. Funk refuses to stay down though and keeps coming, leading to some great drama where Funk tries to pull himself to his feet whilst Raven mocks him.

The medical team and an extra referee come down to the ring, seemingly bringing the match to a close. Funk is eventually carried out, leading to Big Stevie Cool running down to attack Raven, only for Lee to attack Stevie. This brings Sandman’s wife Lori Fullington and her son Tyler down to the ring, with Lori trying to stop Raven attacking Stevie, causing Raven to DDT her. In storyline Raven had stolen Sandman’s family from him by getting Lori on board, but by attacking Lori he’s lost control of Tyler, leading to Tyler bringing his Dad out for the save.

Sandman runs wild on the Heels with his Singapore Cane and catches Raven with a DDT to pick up the three count and seemingly win the match, even though he wasn’t officially in the match to begin with. Ah, ECW.

WINNERS: SANDMAN(?) & TOMMY DREAMER
RATING: ***

Thoughts: The wrestling wasn’t great here but the storytelling was on point and there was excellent drama. Funk, Stevie and Sandman would all eventually end up fighting one another to decide who would get the shot at Raven, with Funk ultimately prevailing

Sandman leaves the building victorious with his son whilst Dreamer buries the hatchet with Stevie and offers him a handshake, possibly because Stevie openly defied Raven.

We get a hype video for Taz Vs Sabu at Barely Legal. Sadly that one didn’t really live up to the hype, but it was a decent match at least.

“The Extreme Stud” Little Guido w/ “Wildfire” Tommy Rich Vs “The Extreme Rookie” Chris Chetti

Guido was still a mid-card comedy wrestler at this stage, whilst Chetti was playing a fresh faced youngster who had graduated from the ECW Wrestling School. Normally that would be death for someone in ECW, but Chetti was a relative of Taz and that meant the crowd were willing to show a little bit more patience towards him.

Rich cuts a promo before the match starts, revealing that he has dubious Italian lineage, meaning he’s now going to be part of The Full Blooded Italian faction. The joke of course being that no one in the group aside from Guido is actually Italian. Amazingly they got a heck of a lot of mileage out of this running gag. Rich does a good job riling up the crowd in his usual abrasive Heel manner and manages to translate some of that onto Guido ahead of the match.

They do a standard undercard match here, and its fine, if not especially exciting. Guido was a solid mechanic in the ring and Chetti was still green but had good athletic ability, so the actual wrestling is decent, but there’s not a lot of crowd interest outside of some of them jawing with Rich and occasionally booing Guido. Guido is happy to play the Heel at least, doing things like eye gouges and what-have-you in order to maintain control, with Rich helping out when he can with cheap shots.

Chetti does a good job selling Guido’s offence and gets the occasional move to show he’s still alive in the bout, but he spends most of the match on the defensive. Rich demands that Guido head all the way up to the top rope for a big move though and Guido misses, leading to Chetti getting a roll-up OUTTA NOWHERE for the upset three count, which the crowd actually responds quite well to.

WINNER: CHRIS CHETTI
RATING: **

Thoughts: This was a solid undercard bout and the crowd gave Chetti a good pop for his victory, showing that Guido did a good job as a Heel setting up the eventual result

Brian Lee cuts a promo backstage, where he says that he’s a bulldozer for hire who will take anyone out…for the right price. We then get clips of Lee destroying The Pitbull’s and Terry Funk in recent weeks.

Joey Styles is in front of the ECW banner, where he says that Terry Funk has a bad knee and a serious concussion, before sending to a Raven promo.

Raven says that Funk didn’t have the guts to finish their match earlier, which leads to Terry Funk walking in and demanding that Raven stand up to face him. Raven says he wants Funk to live to see someone else fight Raven at Barely Legal. Funk says that the concussion will not stop him, and if Raven won’t stand up to face him, then he’ll get down to Raven’s level to give the ECW Champ a lecture. Funk verbally browbeats Raven, and goes low by saying that Raven is as bad as his (Raven’s) abusive father. Raven is actually speechless following that, which isn’t something that always happens. This segment was fantastic, and a brilliant way to set-up the end to Barely Legal.

Next up we get clips of Axl Rotten Vs Spike Dudley and The Dudley Boyz Vs Da Gangsta’s. I’ve actually reviewed the matches before so I’ll include the full write-up for both below;

Axl Rotten Vs Little Spike Dudley

The “Highway to Hell” cover theme they dub in for Spike is genuinely really good and is basically the real song without the lyrics, which makes me wonder why they feel comfortable using this but are so scared of keeping Jericho’s Evenflow knock-off theme on the WCW shows? I’m guessing Pearl Jam is more litigious than AC/DC are?

They start the fight for this one outside the ring, which leads to Spike being on the defensive early doors, as most of his gimmick was built around getting clobbered. Spike of course sells it all really well, with the crowd being more into Axl than him, perhaps because The Dudley Boyz had gone Heel recently and Spike was getting some hate for it as well even though he’d remained babyface?

Spike does eventually make a comeback, getting a nice rolling cannonball splash off the apron and then following that up with a big cross body block out onto the floor from the top rope. Spike Dudley was way more talented than he often gets credit for and he would have NEVER made it as far as he did in the wrestling business without that talent considering his size.

Spike gets another cross body inside the ring for a two count, but Axl catches him with a lariat on the way down when he tries it again and then goes for a bulldog. Spike counters that though and gets the Acid Drop to seemingly get the pin. Buh-Buh Ray and D-Von run down to cost Spike the match though and Axl follows up with The Dominator for the three count.

WINNER: AXL ROTTEN
RATING: *1/2

Thoughts: This was too short to be rated any higher, but what we got was fine

Spike gets beaten up further by his half-brothers following that, with Axl helping out until Da Gangsta’s show up for some weapons based fun leading into the next match.

The Dudley Boyz (Buh-Buh Ray and D-Von) w/ Sign Guy Dudley Vs Da Gangstas (New Jack and Mustafa)

Buh-Buh and D-Von had only recently aligned at the Crossing The Line…Again show, and it would lead to them becoming one of the most iconic acts in ECW history. Axl sticks around here and gets beaten up as well. This is every New Jack match you’ve ever seen, as he and Mustafa swing weapons blindly at all who get in their way whilst Natural Born Killaz plays over the sound system. If that sounds like something you’d enjoy then you’ll probably enjoy this match.

There is a notable botch where Buh-Buh tries to splash New Jack through a table in the corner but Buh-Buh just bounces off him and then ends up collapsing the table himself when he falls on it, which gets cries of derision from the fans. Someone needs to send that one to Maffew actually as it works for about three of the ongoing running jokes in Botchamania. New Jack eventually tries to Splash D-Von through a table by jumping off the stage area, but he ends up grazing D-Von at most.

Thankfully most of the building didn’t see that and just saw a dude leap off something high, so it gets a nice pop even though the move itself was completely botched. Oh New Jack, you were truly a violent, dangerous, immoral and ludicrously entertaining candle in the wind. New Jack tries to pin D-Von back in the ring, but Axl Rotten breaks that up, leading to D-Von getting a near fall courtesy of an Axl chair shot. Buh-Buh catches New Jack with a Buh-Buh Cutter OUTTA NOWHERE not soon after though and that’s the three count.

WINNERS: THE DUDLEY BOYZ
RATING: NEW JACK MATCH

Thoughts: I think this went on for too long to be honest. They could have probably given a bit more time to Axl Vs Spike and cut some time out of this one. It had the usual New Jack spots and some hilarious botches, so it certainly wasn’t dull, but it wasn’t remotely close to being a good match either. The result was important though as it established The Dudley Boyz as a genuine threat in the tag ranks and they’d soon be holding the tag belts

In Conclusion

The Raven/Stevie/Sandman/Dreamer/Funk melodrama was the highlight of this edition of Hardcore TV, with the promo segment between Raven and Funk being one of the better moments in the history of the show. Not having the real music takes away from these shows somewhat, as you lose some of the counter culture anarchic nature of the product that way, but this was still an action-packed 47 minutes of TV that did an effective way of building hype for Barley Legal.

Recommended show!