With the ECW One Night Stand DVD out today, a few of our InsidePulse Wrestling staffers share their initial post-pay-per-view thoughts on one of the most exciting events of the year:
Jeremy Lambert – Honestly that was one of the best PPVs that was put out by the WWE in a long ass time. Ill post a final thought at the end, here were some of my likes and dislikes
Likes
1. The Matches: I was honestly hooked in on every match. The opener with Jericho/Storm was a good opener and I loved how Jericho went old school with the Lionheart gimmick. The cruiser matches were good. Eddie/Benoit was well…Eddie/Benoit. The main event was a straight up ECW match with buckets of blood, a bunch of damn weapons, a cat fight, and a mother f*ckin flaming table.
2. The Crowd: The ECW crowd delivered. “Lita’s Got Herpes” “I Fucked Lita” You Suck Dick” “Shut The Fuck Up” those are ECW chants. Thise were what I was hoping for when I rented this PPV. I wanted the crowd to speak their mind, and they did
3. Joey Styles: Joey Styles was shooting most of the night it seemed, I like that. Joeys not with the WWE, he could say what he wanted and its not like he would have been fired. He said what he wanted and what he felt. Thats what I wanted from Styles tonight
4. The Ending: I read no internet rumors about the show today. I had no damn clue Austin was showing up. He showed up, provoked a fight, and got one. And ECW won the fight and drank beer. Bischoff got the shit kicked out of him. Im an Austin mark so anything with Austin is awesome in my book, this was no exception
5. Paul Heyman Shoots: Heyman shooting on the WWE stars ruled. “JBL, the only reason you held the title for a year was because Triple H didnt want to work tuesday nights” That was gold. Heyman did a shoot interview that I wanted to see him do. I didnt want to him hold back, and he didnt
Dislikes
1. RVD Shoot Interview: I was disappointed by this because he said the same stuff in an internet interview just a few days ago. I thought we would get more outta him
2. Hell In A Cell Promo: I hate how the promoted Batista/HHH during the PPV. They knew a lot of people were renting the ECW PPV so they tried to take advantage of it by promoting Raws PPV
3. No Hat Guy: Hat Guy is probably the biggest ECW, not seeing him there kinda sucked
4. Censors: They censored a lot of shit said by some people like RVD, Bischoff, Austin, and Heyman. That kinda sucked considering it is an ECW PPV and all
5. Eddie Guerrero: I didnt like how Eddie carried his gimmick over to the PPV. He should have just gone out and had a fun with with Benoit, instead he tried to act super heelish. That hurt the match I think
*Most of my dislikes are little things but things that just erked me. Anything thats not in the dislike category, I liked it. Overall this has been the best PPV of the year to me. Too bad it was only a One Night Stand.
Inside Pulse- 10/10
Bambi Weavil – I haven’t been that emotionally connected to wrestling in a really long time. I’m sure I’ll go in-depth on this in my next column, but I want to say, this was Wrestlemania to many of the ECW talent. If they never get a Wrestlemania on their resume, this was their’s. Emotionally, audience wise and I’m sure pay wise. It was fun to watch, it was a great walk down memory lane. I’m not an Awesome mark by any means and I quite frankly think he’s too careless in the ring with his opponents (and you can’t do that when their are other objects in the ring that could stick in your spine, such as tables) but that was an incredible display, for Tanaka’s pain tolerance alone. I am thrilled Joey Styles was involved and wish Foley wouldn’t have made it all about him at certain points but he let Styles headline the commentary at least. When people think of this PPV they are going to think of the crowd, Heyman and RVD’s shoots, the main event and overall remembering what made ECW such a special part of wrestling history. One Night Stand will go down as one of the greatest moments in history, the real question is now what from here, is this really going to be it. I don’t think it will.
InsidePulse: 9/10 – The PPV would have gotten a 10 on emotions alone, however, overall, a 9 because I wish they had given matches more time and less WWE face time.
Jed Shaffer – I haven’t purchased a PPV since Royal Rumble 2000, haven’t watched a full episode of Raw in over a year, and a full episode of Smackdown in at least two years. Call it exhaustion, call it ennui, whatever you will; I just haven’t cared much about wrestling (hence my 3/4-retirement from RTB).
But my ECW fandom has never died. It just had no outlet for release…until June 12th.
Everything I could possibly want (short of a Tommy/Raven final match, but who’s nitpicking?) in an ECW reunion/homage was present, from shoot interviews to extreme action, and the rowdiest crowd on earth. I marked out more times last night then I have in the past 4 years, I laughed, I got teary, I was shocked and amazed…
Quite simply, for the first time since WrestleMania 17…I actually had a GOOD TIME watching wrestling. This is what my inner wrestling fan needed; something to rebuild the faith and restore the mark in me.
Now let’s hope the success leads to Heyman having SOMETHING to do with creative…control of one show, both shows, an ECW revival, whatever: LET THIS MAN DO THE BOOKING, VINCE!!!
