What I am about to say, is purely my opinion. Let me say, I speak for no one but myself and I'm not a HUGE fan of WWE either, I don't like a lot of what they do. I guess, I never liked ECW because I'm old school. I was a pro-wrestler for 10 years, I trained at Jimmy Valiant's school (camp) in Shawsville, Virginia, and grew up watching NWA, UCW, WCCW, USWA, etc. I enjoyed the psychology aspect, the huge pops for something unexpected. Like Nikita Koloff taking the US Title from Magnum. When a Russian, took the US Title, oh man...I thought the world had ended (I was a kid). It meant something when a guy cheated and used a weapon. However, ECW took things well beyond the believability factor. I realize what the guys did, took a lot of guts and heart. It's name said it all: Extreme. For me, it was just to much. I miss the days where the boys tried to protect the business and never broke kayfabe. What ECW did was depict assault with a deadly weapon for the most part. Weapons were used in almost every match and the idea of a weapon, meant nothing. I can remember, when heels would hide a weapon on his person, the ref would frisk him for weapons at the beginning of a match, and the heel would move it from his boot, to under his arm and back as the ref wasn't looking. The heel would milk that hidden weapon all match. The fans anticipation of that hidden weapon, really got them jacked. Especially when the face later caught him with it, and tossed it out of the ring, or when the heel FINALLY used it. All of that psychology, was pissed away in ECW. Sure, they had AWESOME matches sometimes with Jericho, Benoit, Guerrero, etc, but most of the time it was guys that wouldn't know a wristlock from a wristwatch: Balls Mahoney (spelling?), Dreamer, Sabu, Sandman, New Jack etc...just juicing for an hour or calling nothing but high spots, it drained the fans, and they didn't know when to cheer, or get excited. The entire idea of psychology was thrown out the window as there were no count outs and no dq's. You could do whatever, whenever. So for me, even as a worker, I would wonder how the marks were entertained by it. I mean, if you can't get dq'ed, just bring a bat to every match. Have another guy interfere every match. Kick him in the balls, over and over until he submitted. Poke his eyes out. Yeah, yeah, entertainment, fake. But what you "sell" has to make sense. If you can do whatever you want, when you want, then just do what it takes from the beginning and get it over with. Why would some of the meanest, nastiest guys on the planet, play nice for the first 5minutes and THEN break bad. It made no sense. If it's about winning, money and winning titles, and ultimately, that is what people cheer for, they cheer for their guy to win. So if there was no penalty for cheating, just cheat from the beginning. To me, it just didn't make sense. Why set a table on fire to put a guy through it? If you wanna burn him, put the lighter fluid on HIM and set HIM on fire, that should do it. The guys in the business that I worked with, frowned on ECW in a big way. They were referred to as glorified stuntmen. With no understanding of the business. A lot of fans I spoke to, became burnt out on the product quickly and found themselves wondering "Whats next?" What can they do, to top themselves? ECW was for SURE, hardcore, but they backed themselves in to a corner they couldn't get out of. Even though it's entertainment, and we know it's fake, there IS a line that shouldn't be crossed because once you do, you can't come back. Finishing moves meant nothing. It doesn't make sense for a guy to get pinned with a DDT or powerbomb, if the previous week he was just hit by a car and thrown off a building and didn't lose. Having said all that, let me say this, obviously not EVERYBODY thought ECW was garbage. However, at the end of the day, did ECW survive? No. They had HUGE payroll problems at the end for a reason: What they did...didn't work. It didn't work enough to meet payroll and it didn't work enough to keep the company afloat. Just my two cents.
