ShinobiMusashi
Getting Noticed By Management
Extreme Championship Wrestling
A Matter Of Respect
May 11th 1996
ECW Arena
Philly, PA
A Matter Of Respect
May 11th 1996
ECW Arena
Philly, PA
Alright, so I was a little underwhelmed by our last show. I thought it was a good show, but not one of the best. This show on the other hand is one of the highly acclaimed ECW shows that I believe deserves every bit of love that it gets. This show takes place about 3 weeks after Hostile City Showdown 96. Not much has happened in ECW in between shows. They had a house show in Jim Thorpe, Maryland, and Reading Pennsylvania. Other than a rare meeting between Shane Douglas and Rob Van Dam, we didn't miss much from these 3 house shows. Also going on during this time in 1996 was the WWF In Your House: Beware of Dog pay per view, which takes place about a week after this show. Beware of Dog was the first live PPV I ever got to see, since it was given away for free due to a thunderstorm induced blackout during the original airing. Much like 1995, I have a lot of fond memories of being a WWF mark during this time in 1996. The Mankind vs Taker feud was one of the greatest things ever done in wrestling history, and was growing to involve Goldust around this time.
More importantly, this show takes place about a week before a very pivotal weekend in the history of pro wrestling. May 19th was the final appearance of Kevin Nash and Scot Hall in the WWF. Razor, Diesel, HBK, Triple H, and the 123 Kid all broke kayfabe during Hall & Nash's final show at Madison Square Garden for a group hug in the center of the ring as a final farewell, "The Curtain Call". That same weekend WCW put on their Slamboree pay per view which featured an uneventful 10 minute main event with The Giant vs Sting, as well as the ill fated "Battlebowl Tournament", which was won by DDP. A week after Slamboree Scot Hall made his WCW debut and declared that if WCW wanted a war, they got one. I remember these days well. I hadn't found out about ECW yet, but this was still a very exciting time to be a pro wrestling fan. I remember when Hall debuted 2 of my wrestling nerd friends from school were ringing my phone off the hook with the obligatory "ARE YOU FUCKING WATCHING THIS!?" call. No tweets or texts, or internet party threads back then, just a good ole fashion land line call.
I remember we thought a full on WWF vs WCW war was about to legit go down. We referred to Hall and Nash as Diesel and Razor for several weeks before the "Hall & Nash" monikers finally sank in. Good times.
So lets fire up this ECW masterpiece shall we? We got some pretty good ECW gems here, as well as the continuation of the Rob Van Dam vs Sabu series. Lets dig into this thing and see how it's held up over time, and how it compares to what else was going on in pro wrestling in May of 1996.
The show opens up with some lovely classical music with a graphic on the screen that resembles a wedding invitation. It says "Extreme Championship Wrestling cordially invites you to The ECW Arena on the eleventh evening of May. Nineteen hundred and Ninety six for an evening titled A Matter of Respect".
El Puerto Ricano vs Damien 666
The show then begins with this match already in progress. Joey says that the match has been like a tribute to Sabu as apparently these guys have been imitating him. Damien 666 did use a few Sabu moves in his match against Raven at a past show. We don't get to see much of this before Sabu comes running in. Sabu lands a nice splash out of the ring onto both men on the outside. Sabu tosses a chair into both of their faces, and this fucking crowd is white HOT!
Really loud SABU! chants as he sets both guys up on a single table on the outside, gets in the ring, and lands an awesome catapult legdrop. The crowd explodes with E! C! DUB! chants.
Really awesome opener. It wasn't a match, but Sabu fucking rules. Especially at this stage of his career. This crowd is fucking pumped!
10/10
Devon Storm & Damien Kane vs The Dudleys
Joel Gertner is our ring announcer still. I don't know what happened to Bob Artese, but he was with the promotion going back to the TSWA days, and he just kind of disappeared at the end of 95. Gertner was actually a really good announcer(who was also fluent in Spanish) though. Definitely better than the current WWE announcer who sounds like he's having a bowel movement everytime he says WWE.
Damien Kane is billed from Badstreet USA for some unholy reason. D-Von and Buh Buh are accompanied by several of the "non-Dudleys", Chubby, DW(in a wheelchair), Sign Guy. Big Dick is not here for this one. The crowd chants "WHAT'S YOUR NAME!?" at Buh Buh to get him to do his stuttering bit, which was surprisingly over. Buh Buh stutters his name and makes a remark about Damien Kane's valet's(Lady Alexandria) tits. Kane freaks out and tries to get at him. Lady Alexander distracts Buh Buh by pulling his glasses off and trying to seduce him. Damien Kane attacks him from behind.
This kicks off a really stiff brawl. These guys beat the shit out of each other in one of the stiffest matches I've seen so far into this project. Really hard chair shots from everyone. Devon Storm lands a very stiff dropkick on D-Von from the top rope that looks like it hurts him for real. The crowd is just crazy hot all through this match. This is got to be one of the hottest crowds yet so far into this show. Buh Buh Ray beats the shit out of Damien Kane on the outside of the ring with chairs and a slam through a table. Buh Buh's character has really gotten a lot more serious since D-Von came around. He's just really brutal here in this match. Buh Buh and D-Von work together in the ring on Devon Storm. Buh Buh hits him with a nice splash in the corner that is followed up by a stiff as hell elbow from D-Von that might have been payback for the botched dropkick earlier in the match. The match cuts away to a later part where all four men appear to be working a standard, traditional tag match.
HOLY FUCK! D-Von backdrops Devon Storm out of the ring onto DW in the wheelchair for a really nasty bump. Holy shit.
All hell breaks loose again in the ring and the crowd just eats it up. They respond loudly to every bump, every chair shot, everything so far in this match gets a really loud reaction. One pretty cool spot happens when all four men are in the ring, and all simultaneously make a mad dash at a single chair that lays in the center of the ring. D-Von gets the chair and destroys Devon Storm and Damien Kane with sick chair shots to the head. 2 a piece. D-Von then blasts Buh Buh with another really, really hard chair shot. The ref gets dropped next, which brings an end to the match. Devon Storm and Damien Kane get the win by DQ after 14 minutes.
The non Dudleyz pull Buh Buh and D-Von apart as this one cuts away.
6.4/10
Not a really bad brawl at all. Some really stiff stuff here, and some wild bumps. The chair shots were just brutal in this match. There was some stuff cut out, but I don't know how much. It's hard to grade the match with stuff missing, but I'll grade what I saw here. They did have some moments where everyone was gassed out tired and wondering what to do next, but really this wasn't as bad as it could have been. The crowd for this show is probably more hyped up than any ECW crowd in any of the shows I've reviewed up to this point. This crowd is just insane.
The FBI(JT Smith & Little Guido) vs Axl Rotten & Hack Myers
Guido and Smith are shown in the ring first with Joel Gertner. Guido wraps Gertner up with his Italian Flag. The crowd is booing these guys pretty hard. JT Smith gets the mic and starts singing Fly Me To The Moon by Sinatra. He gives his cousin Guido a kiss like Italian mobsters, and out comes Axl and Hack. Myers and Rotten come out to an old school Marilyn Manson song from his first album. Pretty cool looking tag team actually.
Axl is billed from New Castle England, and gets a surprisingly good reaction from the fans considering how he's been jobbed out all through 1996 so far. The bell rings and we get A BUNCH of stalling from Guido and Smith. They really draw this thing out, even doing the whole "Fuck this, we're leaving" skit. They stall this thing out for several minutes to open this up. Axl and JT Smith finally tie up, and we have a weird moment in the match where JT Smith smacks Axl on the ass. Guido reaches into the ring and smacks him when he's got his back turned to him. I'm getting the vibes that they were trying to get some Gay heat for the FBI here. It was subtle, but you could see it. Not sure I like Gay heat, unless it's just over the top like what Goldust was.
Hack Myers gets the hot tag in, and we have more stalling from Guido and Smith. They take it out to the isle and taunt the fans. Smith takes a swing at several fans, even knocking Straw Hat Guy's hat off of his head. That's like the ultimate heel thing to do.
The match cuts ahead, thank god, and we see Hack Myers fighting Guido. Myers lands his trademark legdrop on the apron, then goes up top. JT Smith pushes him off the top, but he rolls onto Guido with a Victory Roll pinfall attempt. Guido falls down to sit on Myers' chest for the pin. JT reaches in and holds Guido's arms for extra leverage to get the 1, 2, 3 at 10:55.
6/10
Another edited match, but as for what made the tape I wasn't impressed with anything. Nothing really terribly unwatchable, but I've never been a big fan of stalling like this from heels. It's a pretty cheap way to get heat. Not a real bad match though, especially considering it's just mid-card filler.
ECW World Championship 3 Way Dance: Raven(C) vs The Sandman vs Pitbull 2
Supposedly the setup for this match was that there was an online fan voting poll to decide who Raven's next challenger would be. Sandman and Pitbull 2 tied, so Commissioner Todd Gordon setup the three way dance. Raven comes out first with his crew of lackeys, The Fabulous Ones, as their billed here, Stevie Richards and The Blue Meanie(with his girlfriend, who is really hot, whoever she is?). The Meanie dances around with his girl acting like a clown. He is wearing HBK style chaps on his legs. He does an HBK dance and removes them, then removes his pants with Stevie Richards, showing everyone their red and blue Underoo's. Raven just sits in the corner with a strait face through it all.
The Pitbulls come out next to the always awesome White Zombie Thunderkiss '65 tune. MAN! Francine is HOOOOOOT!!! It's a damn shame I can't find any of these pics online to add to this review because she absolutely has to be seen in this outfit. She's not wearing her "Beastmaster" leathers, but a very revealing bra and panties outfit that is to die for. :amanda:
Pitbull 2 comes to the ring wearing a bandage around his head. Pitbull 1 is wearing a sling on his arm from an attack from The Eliminators at one of the previously mentioned house shows. I can't stress enough how hot Francine looks here. If anybody knows how to capture still images from a DVD let me know how to do it. Metallica's Enter Sandman comes on next and the fans all clap along with it as The Sandman comes out with Scorpio and Missy Hyatt. The three walk around the ring posing for the entire duration of the song as everyone just stands around awkwardly waiting in the ring. Gertner goes through and does the intros for everyone with Raven getting one of the better reactions from everyone. Pitbull 2 and Sandman were massively over, and got great reactions, but Raven's reaction from the fans was the loudest, which is interesting considering how he was booked to be one of the slimiest chicken shit heels in wrestling history.
I love the way this match starts off. All three men tie up in a 3 way clinch, with Pitbull 2 pushing both men to the ground a couple of times to look like a strong beast. Pitbull 2 really looks good early on kicking both guys asses. Pitbull misses a clothesline and goes to the outside. Raven drops Sandman early for a DDT, but Sandman kicks out of the pin. This fucking crowd is awesome. Sandman and Raven take turns hitting Pitbull 2 with a Singapore Cane and a steel chair. Pitbull 2 takes several shots, but won't go down. Raven and Sandman turn to each other with the Cand and Chair, and go back and forth between each other and Pitbull 2. Pretty awesome moment with Pitbull staying up while Sandman and Raven go back and forth. Pitbull 2 hulks up and the crowd goes WILD! He lands a double clothesline on both Raven and Sandman over the top. Pitbull slams Raven into the railing before landing a pretty awesome flying leg drop from the apron onto him as he teeters the rail. I just can't stress enough how hot this crowd is here. Man this is awesome.
All three men brawl with a chair on the outside. The crowd pops loudly for everything. Deep, loud "OHH!"'s for every little strike. I love it. Sandman canes the shit out of both guys, with each of them breaking up a nearfall. Sandman blasts Raven with the cane before doing his plancha cane shot over the top to hit Pitbull 2 on the outside. This match is awesome!
Raven follows Sandman and does a surprisingly good looking plancha onto both men that gets a great pop from the crowd. This crowd is intense, and you can tell the performers are really feeding off of it. All three men lay sprawled out on the floor as the fans start chanting for the Pitbulls. They bash each other into the railing before Raven and Sandman double backbody drop Pitbull 2 over the railing into the crowd. Raven takes The Sandman to the ring to land a few suplexes.
Pitbull 2 comes into the ring and give Raven a dangerous as fuck looking Tiger Driver. All three guys go through one of those hectic series where they keep hitting each other with devastating moves and breaking each other's pinfalls up. Pretty nice, frantic action. I'm seriously loving this match right now. They get a little sloppy as you can see them visibly winded from the pace of the match so far. Sandman lands a super rana on Pitbull 2, with Raven breaking up the pin. Raven goes for a double DDT, but Sandman and Pitbull 2 counter it with a double Gordbuster. Reallly scary landing that looked like it could have almost paralyzed him. Shit! Sandman and Pitbull 2 sandwich Raven with a simultaneous clothesline. They go after each other with a clothesline, but they sandwich the referee on accident. The ref is down and out. 2 Cold Scorpio comes in and drops a knee on Pitbull 2. Pitbull 1 comes in and fights with Scorpio, pulling him out of the ring. Stevie Richards comes in and drags Raven over The Sandman's body, but the ref is still out. Pitbull 2 sets a table up on the top rope. He tries to put The Sandman up top for a Superbomb, but the table falls out of balance and teeters over, dumping The Sandman to the floor in an inadvertently awesome spot. More sloppiness ensues with the referee still out. Sandman botches a flying cane shot from the top rope and looks to have legitimately injured his knee. NO WAY he can sell that good. This has to be real.
Raven manipulates Pitbull 2 to help him fight Sandman. The two men work together to Superbomb The Sandman, but Raven breaks up the pinfall by kicking Pitbull 2 with a loaded boot. Raven pins Pitbull 2 to eliminate him first, but I'll be god damned if he didn't look like a strait up monster in this match.
From here the shit hits the fan. Francine comes in and attacks Raven. The Blue Meanie's girlfriend comes in and attacks Francine and we have THE HOTTEST MOTHERFUCKING CATFIGHT EVER! Holy shit. Missy Hyatt comes in and canes both women out of the ring. This crowd is WHITE HOT! Sandman rolls Raven up for a surprise rollup, and the crowd loses it when Raven kicks out. Sandman rolls Raven up again, and the crowd counts along and gasps again when Raven barely kicks out. Sandman lands a DDT and the crowd pops. They are so sure we have a new champ, but Raven kicks out again. Outstanding crowd with some excellent nearfalls here. So tense and dramatic. I love this shit.
Stevie comes in and accidentally kicks Raven. The crowd explodes with one of the loudest pops I've ever heard. Sandman chases Stevie down on the outside and tears the railing apart. The crowd goes insane as Sandman throws the railing into the ring. Raven attacks Sandman, but he get's slammed down face first into the railing as it's propped up on the ropes. The crowd goes ape shit with the E! C! DUB! chants. Sandman backdrops the railing on Raven, but Raven catches him a bit later with a well timed DDT on the railing to put The Sandman away at 18:20.
I love the crowd reaction after the pinfall. It's a nice mixture of cheers and gasps of disappointment. The crowd loved the match, they were happy to see Raven retain, but Sandman was so close they couldn't help but sympathize for him.
Raven leaves with his belt as The Pitbulls come back out and fuck up the Blue Meanie. The Sandman canes the shit out of him. The Pitbulls and The Sandman work together to Superbomb the Blue Meanie's fat ass. An air horn goes off as he slams into the canvas, and it just adds to the insanity.
The crowd just goes ape shit. The Pitbulls give The Sandman a beer and have a beer bash afterwards. Sandman guzzles the beer with one swig before smashing the can over Pitbull 2's head. Sandman shakes hands and hugs with the Pitbulls as the crowd cheers them all on. Sandman gets a mic and tells The Pitbulls they earned his respect. He gives them Missy Hyatt, who starts kissing on them. . Francine comes back out pissed off. She pulls Missy away from her Pitbulls and another cat fight breaks out. The Pitbulls and Sandman pull their women apart and shake hands out of respect before going their separate ways. 9/10
Man this was an incredible match. The crowd had a lot to do with it, as it's definitely the hottest ECW crowd I've seen for any match since the epic 911 chokeslam on Fonzie at Gangstas Paradise 95. The nearfalls at the end were just amazing. I know I may get lynched here for this next comparison, but I couldn't help but be reminded of the similar psychology used in the recent three way matches in the WWE between John Cena(Sandman) vs Ryback(Pitbull 2) vs CM Punk(Raven). Some truly masterful booking in this match that really had the crowd eating out of the performers hands. It was beautiful. There were a couple of sloppy moments where things almost unraveled due to fatigue, but they rebounded well. I love how strong Pitbull 2 looked in defeat, even though he was the first one to be eliminated. Raven escapes town with his title again by the skin of his fucking teeth this time. Some great stuff.
Chris Jericho vs Mikey Whipreck
Right off the bat we get the heel and face established for this match with two simple tie ups. The first tie up see's Whipreck force Jericho into the ropes. The referee orders the break, and Mikey breaks clean. They tie up again, and this time Jericho forces Mikey into the ropes. The ref demands a break, and Jericho complies....followed by a smack in the face.
Jericho then shines with a really nice grappling sequence starting with a waist lock from behind, into a German Suplex, into a leg grapevine, and ending with Jericho locking Mikey into a really nice looking Bow and Arrow submission. Jericho then worked his kicks. He lands a kick to Mikey's face and midsection, then snap mares him over to a seated position for his kick to the back. Jericho continues to play the role of the heel in the match with more kicks, punches, and some really hard chops. Mikey reverses a whip into the corner and lands a dropkick. Mikey then snap mares Jericho down and immediately grapevines his leg to put him in the "Muta Lock".
Joey Styles commentary in this show has been phenomenal. Love the way he calls the holds.
Mikey's Muta Lock gets a nice applause from the fans. The crowd is nowhere near as into this match as they were the previous one. Mikey continues to work Jericho's legs with a submission. Jericho pulls Mikey's hair trying to escape the hold. Jericho finally scoots to the ropes and Mikey breaks clean. Chris Jericho lands another kick to the body and works his way back into the match. He lands a delayed vertical suplex, a spinning heel kick, and a slingshot splash. There appears to be a small group of Canadian fans in attendance there to support Jericho, holding up a Canadian flag. Jericho lands another spinning heel kick followed by a powerbomb, and then a Tombstone attempt. Mikey reverses the Tombstone and spikes Jericho. Mikey tries to go up for a move from the top, but Jericho follows him up and dropkicks him to the outside railing. Jericho then follows Mikey and tosses him into the crowd. Jericho piles a bunch of chairs on top of Mikey and hits him as he's piled up. Jericho just continues to play the heel, with no respect for Mikey.
Mikey teases a comeback by landing a Rocker Droper(Famasser). Jericho reverses a whip and hits Mikey with a couple of splashes in the corners. Mikey moves out of the way of the third splash, causing Jericho to crash into the post. Mikey shoves Jericho into the audience and gets back into the ring to land a somersault from the top rope. Not a bad spot. Mikey takes it back to the ring and hits his Super Rana. Jericho takes Mikey's back in a clinch, and spins him around for a Fisherman Suplex, followed up with the Lionsault for 2. They go back and forth with an exchange of nearfalls and some really nice chain sequences. Mikey goes up top for a move, but Jericho drops him to his groin with punches. Jericho climbs up and drops him off the top with a Double Underhook Suplex to put him away with a clean pinfall after 14:21.
Chris Jericho offers Mikey a handshake after the match. Mikey accepts. They shake hands and hug it out before Jericho raises Mikey's hand.
7.8/10
Pretty good match. I wasn't blown away by anything, but the selling was solid, and the psychology was there. The crowd was really not into the match at all, but it was solid. One of the better Chris Jericho ECW matches for sure. I liked how he played the heel role for the match, and the way it worked out with the respectful aftermath. So far I'm really, really liking the overall theme of the show being respect, with each match tying into that somehow.
End of tape 1. For best storage rewind tape and store in a cool dry place.(h)
). It really took the excitement out of the crowd when they all realized that we were going to see The Bruise Bros come into the picture. They just couldn't get over in ECW for the life of them. There's nothing I can really say to save this, it was just bad all around. With that said though, I'm still pumped to see Gangstas and Eliminators finally have a fucking match. I still like the overall concept of dragging the feud out for as long as possible, just the execution of it here was way off, especially the way they were coming off of a big schmozz shoot fight and a heel cheating his way to a title retention. At some point this crowd needs something to get happy about to keep them in the show. 
