by Scotty Szanto-Nicodemus 
Exclusive to OnlineOnslaught.com

Enjoy:

ECW: History in Review
#7 and #6

(Disclaimer:  This is not meant to be a “History of ECW” piece.  There are plenty of places where you can go to get the historical minutia that you desire, and I am not the man to give that info to you anyway.  I started watching ECW regularly just before they got their show on TNN, and so I was really only a die-hard fan of the fed for a little over a year before they went out of business.  But, in that time, and since that time, I have collected as many ECW tapes as I could afford to get my hands on.  Based on the tapes in my collection, I have gathered together a few Top Ten Lists.  Once again, these are not meant to be universally accepted as the top moments/matches/whatever in ECW history; rather, they represent some of my favorite moments/matches/whatever that appear in my tape collection.)

#7

Joel Gertner Poem:

Occasionally, the network would censor Joel’s poems, and so I will indicate any censored words by including them in brackets {such as this}.

Joel…  
“I’m a sexual deviant and a bedroom menace.
When I watch Wimbledon, I like to see
The 18-year-old girls in their little skirts playing tennis.
The way they handle that racquet, and their spectacular ball control,
Makes me want to take my racquet, and my balls
And shove it in their {hole}.”  
…Gertner

And sometimes, Joel’s poems danced on the line between good taste and bad!
 

Promo:

Sinister Minister and Mikey Whipwreck promo on WCW.

This was early in the Sinister Minister’s reign in ECW…in fact he might not have even been given that name yet.  At any rate, he begins the promo by telling us that a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend informed him that WCW would be interested in hiring him, along with Mikey Whipwreck, his personal minion.  (Both men were previously employed by WCW, by the way, and their abilities were completely mis-handled…that’s as polite as I can phrase it without starting a long rant bashing WCW.)  The minister goes on to tell us that he “wouldn’t be caught dead in that third rate promotion.”  He steps backward and lies down in a coffin while speaking, and Mikey closes the lid and starts with the maniacal laughter.

Just then, the minister bursts out of the coffin and says, “Wait a minute Mikey!  This is no laughing matter.”  Mikey shrugs his shoulders and says, “Yeah padre, screw them.  I hate ‘em, too.”  Mitchell issues an open challenge to Eric Bischoff, and then closes the promo by slapping Mikey and saying, “THIS is where you laugh!”
 

Angle:

Cyrus strips RVD of the TV Title.

Rob Van Dam broke his leg just two months before celebrating two years as ECW Television Champion.  When he did, Cyrus, in his role as Technical Wrasslin’ Advisor for the Network, decided that, “If the Whole f’n Show breaks his f’n leg, then the Network finds itself with no f’n show,” and he is going to strip RVD of the title.  So, the 2/25/00 show on TNN from Milwaukee starts with Cyrus in the ring, and he tells us that tonight he will force Paul Heyman to hand-over the TV Title, “and Paul, bring me a cup of coffee while you’re at it.”  Paul E. enters the arena carrying the belt, as we hit the opening credits!

Paul is in the ring being berated by Cyrus when we come back.  Cyrus tells Paul E. that his days as a corporate rebel are over, and it is time for him to bend-over for the Network and sell Rob Van Dam out.  Paul continues to pace around the ring clutching the belt, as Cyrus yells over and over, “Give it to me, Paul!  Give it to me!”  I know you can see it coming, but I’ll recap it anyway: Paul shrugs, turns, and gives Cyrus the belt upside the head!  Rhino hits the ring and takes-out the boss with a Gore, and Sandman makes the save.

Two weeks later, at the ECW Arena, we again find Cyrus in the ring, and this time he is calling-out RVD himself.  Cyrus tells him that without the TV Title, there will be no ECW show on TNN.  Van Dam, on crutches, is here to give us a progress report…he’s feeling fine, and while the broken leg has kept him out of the ring, it hasn’t kept him out of the gym, and he’s going to be better than ever when he makes his comeback.

He goes on to tell Cyrus that while other people have left ECW for “what they thought was greener pastures”, the fans could always count on one thing when they bought their tickets…they would get to see Rob Van Dam defend the World Television Title.  That’s true, you know.  Van Dam ends the promo by telling Cyrus, “Good luck finding someone to fill the shoes of the standard I’ve set as ECW World Television Champion,” and dropping the belt at Cyrus’ feet.
 

Moment:

Tony Mamaluke’s debut match against Mikey Whipwreck.

I was living in Wisconsin at the time of this ECW on TNN broadcast (6/2/00), but Amey and I were back in Ohio visiting, so we had to convince some friends…friends that don’t watch wrasslin’…to allow us to hook our vcr up to their cable and record the show.  So we all watched, and I edited out the commercials…much to the amusement of our friends!  Out comes Tony Mamaluke for his debut match, against former World Heavyweight Champion (and at the time, one of the favorite wrasslers of yours truly) Mikey Whipwreck.  When Mikey was tossed out to the floor, Mamaluke leaped from the middle turnbuckle, and jumps completely over, and about two feet to the right of Whipwreck.  Having flipped over so that he was coming down back first, Mamaluke landed neck first on the steel guardrail, and then flipped over into the first row!  It’s the sort of thing that makes me cringe just thinking about it.

A brief aside: There’s a guy that lives in the dorm that I work in, and he trained alongside Tony Mamaluke, under Dean Malenko in Florida.  That young man wrassled under the name Mario Marx, and he tells me that on many instances during Tony’s training, Dean would turn to him and say, “You really should find yourself another profession.”
 

Match:

Taz (ECW) v. Sabu (FTW): Title Unification Match.

The backstory goes something like this: Taz had no belt, so he created the FTW Heavyweight Title, complete with a belt that he defended…and lost to Sabu.  After Taz became the official ECW World Heavyweight Champion, they had this match to “unify” the ECW World Title with the unrecognized FTW belt.  Joey Styles refers to this feud as “the most hate-filled feud in professional wrasslin’”, for whatever that’s worth.  Taz gets on the mic before the match starts, and says that because the fans had to wait out in the rain for three hours, they should make it an Extreme Death Match, and just like that falls will count anywhere in the building.  One other thing that I should point out before the match begins is that Sabu is wrasslin’ with a fractured jaw (rather legit or not, I am not the one to say), and so his lower jaw is heavily taped.

After the opening back n forth, Taz lands a punch to the jaw and Sabu crumbles to the mat.  Taz goes for a Crossface, but Sabu is able to successfully block it, and both men are up.  Taz gets the quick go-behind and gets a takedown, at which point he is able to connect with a series of Crossface strikes to the jaw.  Sabu is obviously hurt.  Taz comes off the ropes with a big boot to the face, and Sabu would be totally motionless on the mat if it weren’t for his writhing in pain and clutching his jaw.  Sabu isn’t going to go out that easily, however, and he reverses a whip to the ropes and comes off the ropes with a Springboard Sidekick, which gets him only two.  Bill Alphonso introduces a chair into the match, which Sabu immediately throws into Taz’s face, and follows that up with Air Sabu!  Unbelievably, Sabu is actually in control of the match as both men go outside the ring.  Taz is tossed over the railing into the first row, and then Sabu goes for a triple-jump move, leaping to a chair placed in the ring, to the top rope, and then over the railing into the front row, where Taz is waiting with a steel chair in hand!  Sabu leapt all the way over the railing, only to connect face-first with a chair!  They brawl through the crowd, much to the delight of the fans…including one guy that is dressed-up like Sabu, right down to the white tape on his jaw!  They make their way back to the ringside area, but not before Sabu gets a two-count on the floor, just in case you had forgotten about the Falls Count Anywhere stipulation.  They make it back to the ramp at ringside, and Taz immediately tosses Sabu right back into the crowd!  When finally both men make it back to the ring, there is a table set-up at ringside, and Taz tosses Sabu over the top rope with a Belly-to-Belly Suplex through the table!  Taz follows Sabu outside and drops him face-first onto the steel guardrail.  Sabu is able to gouge the eye in order to get away from him, and both men roll into the ring.  Actually, Sabu rolled under the opposite ropes and Alphonso tends to him on the apron.  Fonzie has a white towel in his hand and motions that he is going to throw in the towel for Sabu…and both Taz and Sabu start to attack him!  When both men are again outside the ring, Fonzie hits Taz across the back with a chairshot that only Lance Storm would love, and Taz chases him back to the locker room area.  We are down to a one-on-one match finally, but that doesn’t last long as Fonzie is back out and tossing tables into the ring.  Taz sets Sabu onto one of the tables and climbs to the top.  Sabu was playing possum, however, and he tosses the table out of the way and brings Taz down from the top with a Huricanrana.  Sabu is up first, but when he goes for another rana in the middle of the ring, Taz turns it into what Joey Styles calls a Tornado Bomb (Twisting Sit-Out Powerbomb).  When they both wind up outside the ring again, Sabu connects with one of the craziest high-risk moves that I’ve ever seen…Taz is laid out on a table that is suspended between the two steel guardrails in the corner, and then Sabu climbs into the ring and from the top turnbuckle he leaps over the corner post and onto Taz and through the table to the floor!  1, 2, and…no.  Sabu gets a couple of nearfalls back in the ring, before Taz regains control with a crazy version of the Pump Handle Suplex, dumping Sabu onto his face.  A Triple-Jump Moonsault is not enough to put away the recognized ECW champ, and Taz again dumps Sabu onto his head with a Head-n-Arm Suplex.  The crowd starts to anticipate that we are nearing end game, but a T-Bone Suplex from the top turnbuckle is not enough to get the 3-count.  Taz sets a table diagonally in the corner, and catches Sabu with a Dragon (Full Nelson) Suplex through the table, and that has got to be it according to Joey Styles.  1, 2, and…no!  Sabu kicked-out at the last possible moment!  Fonzie has thrown-in the towel and yells for the ref to stop the match.  The ref (Jim Molineaux, I believe) ignores him and just shrugs his shoulders as Taz locks-in the Kati Hajime…the submission hold that is illegal in Judo, but legal in ECW.  Sabu grabs the towel and throws it out of the ring as Taz chokes him out.  The winner, and Undisputed ECW Heavyweight Champion of the World is Taz.
 

#6

Joel Gertner Poem:

Of course, as I discussed before, when on ppv, Joel didn’t have to worry about watching his language or being censored, which led to poems such as this one from ECW’s debut in Las Angeles at Heatwave 2000:

Joel… 
“I’m California dreamin’, and I leave the girlies screamin’,
‘Cause I’m a pussy lickin’ demon, with vanilla flavored semen.” 
…Gertner

…Sometimes the most elementary of rhymes get the biggest laughs!

Promo:

Taz is going after Sabu’s jaw.

This is the promo that was shown during the pre-show before the Living Dangerously ppv, which was headlined by the Title Unification Match recapped above.  Footage is shown of the match a month previous in which Taz broke Sabu’s jaw.  When asked about his game plan, Taz says it’s simple; he’s going after Sabu’s jaw like a shark to blood.  The interviewer (who’s name I forget) asks, “Isn’t that a little intense?”  Taz replies that yes, it is intense, but Taz hurts people for a living.  He ends with probably the best catch phrase of all time, “Beat me if you can…Survive if I let you!”
 

Angle:

Rhino gores Sandman & Lori Fullington through a table on Mother’s Day.

Amey and I were in the third row for this ppv, and I’ll have a lot more about it later, but I just want to point out that it was on Mother’s Day because I used that in my argument to get Amey to allow me to spend the extra money for ringside seats…normally we just sit in the cheap seats.  Amey and I aren’t parents, except to our cats, so the ppv tickets that I wanted wound-up being a gift to my wife from my cats!  Pretty sweet, eh?

Anyway, during the Sandman’s match against Rhino, Steve Corino and Jack Victory start to approach the ring.  Lori Fullington sneaks up behind them and takes them out with several shots with a Singapore cane!  Sandman rushes to his wife’s aid on the rampway, and when Rhino catches up to him, he Piledrives the Sandman on the rampway!  After that, Lori slaps Rhino in the face, and let’s just say that wasn’t exactly the right thing to do!  Rhino grabs her and drags her into the ring and then onto the opposite apron, where he picks her up, and then drops down, Piledriving her through the timekeeper’s table to the floor!  Corino and Victory set a table against the turnbuckles in the ring, and Rhino lifts Lori’s broken body up into the ring, where they hold her up for Rhino to Gore through the table.  Sandman makes the save, taking all three out with cane shots.  He scoops his wife up, turns around, and walks right into a Gore, sending both the Sandman and Lori through the table!  That gets the 3-count for Rhino, and after the match he grabs the mic and says, “Happy Mother’s Day, you fucking bitch!”  Indeed.

Before going to the replays, Cyrus assures us that the Network doesn’t condone that sort of behavior on Mother’s Day!
 

Moment:

Mikey Whipwreck hiptosses the ref!

When footage from Wrestlepalooza aired on TNN in April of 2000, the event began with Joey and Joel in the ring as usual, but unlike what usually happened, Mikey Whipwreck was sitting at a table at ringside burning things!  He didn’t interject himself in the proceedings in any way, he just sat there burning things and laughing maniacally (if you weren’t a viewer, that was kind of Mikey’s gimmick for a while).  The show got started with the World Tag Team Champions coming to the ring for an interview, but things got a little sidetracked when Dawn Marie got on the mic and issued an open challenge to any woman in the ECW locker room.  Hit Raven’s music!

Francine quickly hit the ring, followed by Raven, and before Francine could even respond to Dawn Marie’s challenge, Justin Credible attacked Raven from behind.  With Lance Storm standing on the ring apron, things looked suspiciously like a tag team match, but of course Raven had no partner.  At about the time that Raven started to turn the tide against Justin Credible, Mikey makes his way onto the apron, and actually coaxes Raven into tagging him in!  We’ve got ourselves a match, complete with referee Jim Molineaux, who is making his way to the ring.  Mikey comes in, Hiptoss on Justin Credible, Lance Storm comes into the ring and is Hiptossed, another Hiptoss on Credible, another for Lance Storm…Jim Molineaux has made it to the ring…Hiptoss on Molineaux! 
 

Match:

Steve Corino v. Jerry Lynn.

I begged and tried to borrow a copy of this match around the time that it happened at Heatwave 2000…that’s because my friend that was stealing cable forgot to set his VCR to record the ppv when it aired!  I was fired-up to see this match in particular, and yet I didn’t actually get to see it for almost three years, when Amey got a copy of the show for me for my birthday this past summer.  Does the match live-up to that kind of extended hype?  Read on, and you tell me…

Corino brings a bullrope to the ring, because he had just recently defeated Dusty Rhodes in their feud.  Jack Victory also accompanies Corino to the ring, because; well because Jack Victory rules the entire known universe.  That, and the fact that Victory swings with those concrete-like right hands.  Lynn rushes the ring and attacks right away to get things started.  A Dropkick sends Victory outside, and then turns his attention to Corino, laying-in some punches and chops.  A Clothesline sends the King of Old School outside, and when Jack Victory comes over to check on him, Lynn leaps from the top turnbuckle with a Flying Crossbody.  The Southern-California crowd was firmly behind Lynn for this match, as he was teasing a heel/face turn for months after returning from injury.

Lynn stays in control after they go outside again, until Corino crotches him on the steel guardrail.  Corino grabs a chair, gets a few words of encouragement from Victory, and then runs into a Big Boot from Lynn and eats said chair.  Lynn comes off the railing with a Tornado DDT on the floor, and look out…Corino’s bleeding as they make their way back to the ring.  Lynn takes Corino into the corner for the ten-punch count along, but only makes it to nine because Corino brings him out with a Sit-Out Powerbomb for the tenth count.  The camera gives us a gratuitous close-up of Corino’s bloody face, and the first thing out of my mouth is, “Jesus Christ!”  The right side of his face is practically obscured already, and he’s only been bleeding for a minute or two.  After flipping his hair into and out of his face a few times, Corino’s “bleach-blonde locks are stained blood red.” (Joey Styles’ words, not mine.)  Lynn whipped into the ropes, and Corino catches him with a niiiiiice Powerslam.  Jack Victory pulls Lynn out of the ring and drops him across the steel guardrail, while in the ring Corino has referee Mike Keeter distracted.  Corino then goes outside, too, and has a few choice words with the fans at ringside…some of them anyway.  Others are squarely behind the Old School Hero.  We get a couple more shamefully close shots of Corino’s bloody face, and the only word that can be used to describe it is “mask”.  No streams of blood here, as the features of Corino’s entire forehead and cheeks are undetectable under a thick layer of dark crimson red.  I don’t mean to fixate on the blood, but I am in a sort of state of awe at how much Corino is able to bleed and still control the match.  He’s got blood smeared on his chest and upper shoulders now, as well.

Lynn starts to come back with a few punches, but Corino tosses him back with a T-Bone Suplex!  Victory tosses a chair in to Corino, but Lynn hits a Van Daminator, and both men are down.  Corino is up first, and he starts to climb the turnbuckles.  Turns out that wasn’t the best move by our Old School Hero, because Lynn crotches him on the top.  Lynn gets a chair and lays it in the corner, then brings Corino down from the turnbuckles with a mean looking DDT onto the chair.  1, 2, and no!  Lynn holds Corino’s hair in one hand, and then with his other hand he uses Corino’s blood not only to paint Native American-style war paint on his face, but also to write the word “DIE” across his abdomen.

Lynn wastes too much time displaying his handiwork to the crowd, and walks right into a Superkick.  Both men in the corner, where they jockey for position on the second turnbuckle.  Lynn wins that battle, and brings Corino backwards with an Inverted DDT.  That gets a two-count, and then it is time for Lynn to go for the Cradle Piledriver.  Corino jumps behind him though, and connects with the Old School Expulsion.  1!  2!  No!  Lynn kicks out, which draws Jack Victory onto the apron.  Lynn approaches as the ref is trying to admonish Victory, and when Jack tries to throw powder in Lynn’s eyes, he blocks it and the powder goes into referee Mike Keeter’s eyes instead!  Here comes the concrete-like right hand from Victory!  One for Lynn that staggers him, and one for Keeter that puts him down.  Lynn ducks a punch from Corino and hits a Belly to Back Suplex, but there’s noone to make the count.  Lynn gets up to try and revive Mike Keeter, and he doesn’t see that Corino has slipped his boot off, and nails Lynn between the eyes with it!  Corino with a roll-up, to no avail, followed by a roll-up by Lynn.  When Corino kicks out, it sends Lynn into the ropes, where Jack Victory greets him with the cowbell from Corino’s bullrope!  God bless you, Jack Victory.

Both men are down; in fact all three men in the ring are down.  Victory is successfully able to revive both Keeter and Corino, and Steve rolls on top of Jerry for the ultra-slow two-count.  A brief chain-wrasslin’ sequence follows, with rapid two-counts by each guy.  They tie-up again, and when Corino goes for another chain sequence, Lynn reverses it into a Cradle Piledriver and drops Corino on his bloody head.  1, 2, and 3!
 

Closing:

Tomorrow I will have #s 5 and 4, which will include another match from the Mother’s Day show that Amey and I were at, Hardcore Heaven.  Let’s see, what else?  The Dudley Boys, more Taz, a little bit of Public Enemy, and again there will be one censored poem and one uncensored by Joel Gertner. 

PEACE

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