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| Guest Columns | Matt Talbot |
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THE OUTSIDER'S EDGE ECW's Maiden Voyage To keep myself from having to do my math homework, I decided to write up an argumentive paper. See, I was able to watch ECW's debut and I enjoyed it on many levels. Traveling around the web on my board has shown that quite a few people thought the first show to be disappointing. I think that we need to break it down and look at the pros and the cons to the way that they set up their first ever nationally televised show. By the way, I know that many other columnists are going to be talking about ECW and its ramifications, so nothing I say here is going to be totally original, but in today's modern era of United Plagiarists of America, nothing truly is. Just try to sit back and relax and enjoy the feature presentation. Pros: The first half hour being the RVD-JL match from Hardcore Heaven, which, I believe, was their second one. This match is probably the best match that anybody will be able to see on American TV, free or otherwise, this year and was a great match to showcase as vintage ECW. They edited out some of the slower, sloppier parts in the beginning of the match, which was a great idea, because the execution is not that good at the start of the match at HH. The match put ECW's best foot forward, showing the hard work ethic that their wrestlers have and their ability to make most things lost majestic and graceful. Take, for instance, the sunset flip/PBomb through the table. Jerry Lynn does the spot pretty much flawlessly and it is a hard spot to do. If anybody ever saw the Sabu-Taz match from Living Dangerously, then they saw that spot. In that Sabu-Taz match Sabu tries to do the same thing to Taz and totally and completely screws up, because the railing is too close to the apron and Sabu cannot make enough room to PBomb Taz to the ground without hitting his own legs. In the HH match, JL is able to gracefully flip over RVD and cleanly PBomb RVD into the table. So, by putting that match first, ECW puts on of its better matches out there. Another pro was that finishing promo by Taz. First off, I want to say that given the context and the mere simplicity of the promo, it might be the greatest interview of all time, at least that I have seen. It really got over Taz as a ToughMan. All they had was Taz's head with that weird shroud. They did not have a crowd to chant his name or a foil to yell back at him, but Taz was able to get over. He more or less said the list of people that he had choked out that were in WCW and WWF, but he did it in such a gruff manner. The way he said it was kind of like, "Yeah, I did make 'em tap, but it was a while ago. Is there anybody to challenge me now?" The way he methodically went through his "kills" in his deep voice got him over as a machine. Also, the match that they showed of him helped also. People do not seem to like his No-Selling, but I think it helps build his character. Rhino, right off of the bat, does a PBomb onto Taz, but Taz springs right back up and flips Rhino a defiant gesture :). Once again, it gets Taz over as a bad ass, who can take the punishment and then dish it out tenfold, just like he did to BBB, Jerry Lawler, and Shane Douglas. His promo, so filled with passion about the pride he holds over his wins, coupled with the live action match, filled with cool moves to wow the masses, helped show one of wrestling's best kept secrets to the world. The constant mentioning of the past ECW wrestlers, I felt, was really good. They pushed that fact that they had had a hand in the building of Steve Austin and Farooq and Rick Steiner and Hak and so many more. Some people that I read on the Internet seemed to think that it was out of place to have all those people as they had left ECW a long time ago, but I think it was good to show the wrestlers as they can get more fans to show up. If there is a big Steve Austin fan, of which they are quite a few, who happens to be watching and then see his favorite wrestler on this ECW thingy, then they will be more likely to watch it again. He or she might think that they will show footage from several years ago, when his or her favorite wrestler, whoever it may be, was in ECW. The big names get ECW over as more than a small pond next to two oceans. There are more pros to the show, but those are the big three that I can think of. Cons: Although I think that the RVD-JL match was a great match to put on first, I do not think that that is the best match between the two. Their match at LD was much, much better. Their second match built on the first and had better psychology and whatnot, but the execution was sorely lacking. As I said earlier, they cut out about five or ten minutes of holds and reversals that were poorly done. When they first put on that HH match, I thought that it was odd to have such a sloppy match on, but they were smart enough to cut out the supremely sloppy part. The problem was they did not cut out the most screwed up spot that they did. ECW left in the part in the match where they are on the turnbuckle about to do a belly to belly, but then they both fall off. I was surprised that they left it in, because it is a bad piece of wrestling. The proposed move is extremely dangerous and they were not able to pull it off successfully, but I guess Paul E. wanted it in there, because it looks so brutal ('cause it's shoot). That is the only reason why they might want it in there. They also have this badly butchered sunset flip spot right after it, which only leads one to think that the wrestlers are sloppy. I love the match, but think that the LD one was far better as far as execution goes. My theory is that they wanted the sunset flip/PBomb segment in there to wow the masses. Another odd thing was that Sabu part. I liked the way they portrayed him as suicidal, homicidal, and genocidal, but I think that they should not have shown the scars. They looked really disgusting with the lighting that they used and might have turned off some fans. It disgusted me somewhat and I am not usually disgusted. Just a thought. I guess that the only real problem that I personally had with the show was the fact that I felt the LD match was better than the HH one, but I still think that the HH one was absolutely great. Especially since they cut out most of the super-sloppy parts. There was some concern that they did not show most of their talent, but with only one real half hour to showcase all but two of their roster, I think that they did more than an ample job. That Kid Rock song segment was a good way to get names to faces. I think that pros easily outnumber the cons in this situation. There were some bad parts, but nothing as bad as say Sid ruining every single FN match on Nitro or HHH laying his death pall over Raw. In my opinion, it was a smashing debut that helped get over ECW's stars as hard working, bump taking ToughMen. Anyway, if you have a comment, concern, complaint, or question, or just wanna chat about how Bobby Thompson's, Kirk Gibson's, and Carleton Fisk's home runs will never chalk up to Bill Mazeroski's then please email me at talboito@uclink4.berkeley.edu. Matt Talbot freelance Mail the Author |
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