ECW One Night Stand (2005)
Manhattan, New York 6/12/05
I'd like to fist apologize if I spell some people's names wrong, since some of these guys spell their ring names a ton of different ways.
The show opens with Joey Styles in the ring. He does his "OH MY GOD!" line & welcomes people to the show before introducing Mick Foley as his broadcast partner for the evening.
1.) Lance Storm (with Dawn Marie) vs. "Lionheart" Chris Jericho: ***
Jericho is back to his old school "Lionheart" attire. A fine opener. Justin Credible comes out towards the end of the match to help Lance Storm win. The Impact Players celebrate after the match.
Pitbull #1 (Gary Wolf) comes out to lead a remembrance of Extreme Brothers who have past away since ECW's closing.
2.) Three-Way Dance - Tajiri (with The Sinister Minister & Mikey Whipreck) vs. Super Crazy vs. Little Guido (with The FBI): ***
Everyone but Super Crazy comes out with back up, but that doesn't matter because he does his obligatory Moonsault off the balcony onto all of the FBI (which was in full force tonight). A fine Three-Way Dance that saw Super Crazy win.
3.) Psichosis vs. Rey Mysterio Jr: **1/2
Psichosis comes out in his traditional mask but takes it off before that match start. A decent match here. Nothing really spectacular, but's all about nostalgia.
At this point the Smackdown Crusaders/Invaders show up in one of the balconies, led by JBL & Kurt Angle. Joel Gertner comes to them but Angle takes the mic and shoves him away. They run down ECW while the fans shit on them. This leads to RVD coming out! RVD of course wouldn't be wrestling since he was out with a knee injury. He fires back at the Smackdown Guys and talks about his own ECW Career.
Then Rhyno shows up out of nowhere and hits RVD with a GORE!!! The lights then go out....and it's SABU!!!! We have a match, with Bill Alfonso and all!!
4.) Rhyno vs. Sabu (with Bill Alfonso): **1/4
Alfonso, as you would expect, was blowing the hell out of his whistle. This was ok, but what would you expect from a Rhyno/Sabu match? At least someone went through a table...
After the match, RVD celebrates with Alfonso & Sabu as they pay tribute to The Sheik.
Now the Raw guys show up, led by Eric Bischoff & Edge, who are of course shit on by the Pro-ECW Crowd.
5.) "The Crippler" Chris Benoit vs. Eddie Guerrero: ***1/2
A very solid match here. With their friendship in real life, comes great chemistry, which was obvious here. Eddie was still in his heel character he was doing at the time (after he turned on Mysterio). Benoit wins the match.
Joel Gertner shows up again, this time with the Raw guys, but he's shit on again. Bischoff then runs down ECW and the Anti-ECW Crusaders/Invaders turn their backs to the ring for the next match.
6.) Mike Awesome vs. Masato Tanaka: ****
I remember hearing people taking about this match. Now I finally saw it. Basically, they went out there and tried to kill each other....Plain & Simple. Great Match all the same.
Paul Heyman comes out decked in his Black Trench Coat & all. He then talks about ECW and shoots on the Invaders/Crusaders in the balcony. Go look it up on Youtube, it's great.
7.) The Dudley Boyz vs. "The Innovator of Violence" Tommy Dreamer & The Sandman: ***1/4
The Sandman gets to do his full through-the-crowd/beer-bashing entrance, which was awesome! They're about to start when the B.W.O. (that's the Blue World Order) shows up! They cut a little promo before going on the attack. Here comes Kid Kash! Then Ballz Mahoney & Axel Rotten show up with chairs. Kash does a massive dive onto everyone on the outside!! The Impact Players & Spike Dudley end up involved as well. The match sees Cheese Graters, Chairs, and all sorts of other plunder before The Dudley Boyz put Dreamer though a Table that is on Fire to win the match!! More about the classic ECW craziness then anything else.
The Dudleyz go after Beulah (Dreamer's wife, I believe) but Sandman saves her. He asks for a beer, which leads to STONE COLD STEVE AUSTIN (an ECW Alumni himself) coming out. He calls all the ECW guys out for a beer bash! They're in the ring, but Austin says he heard there was going to be an invasion, and calls out the invasion guys to come down & fight them. They do, and as they're in the ring, the music of Tazz plays as he goes right after Kurt Angle, locking in the Tazzmission! Eric Bischoff joins the others on commentary as the two sides brawl. ECW eventually gets the upper hand and disposes of the invaders. Austin then tells Foley to bring Bischoff to the ring, and none of Bischoff's cohorts do nothing to help him. Bischoff then takes a 3D, Diving Headbutt, and a 619. Austin asks Bischoff if he can hear him and asks what he thought of the show. He says "Fuck ECW!" and Austin responds by delivering the Stunner. The Dudleyz carry Bischoff out of the building as the ECW guys end the PPV by having a beer bash in the ring.
Overall: 8.75/10
While the match quality of this show alone was fine overall, this show was all about the nostalgic value and the Invasion Storyline. For me personally, I really enjoyed this. Having not been old enough to watch ECW in it's prime, I got a good taste here of what the original ECW was like, and it was awesome! The molten hot crowd just added to this. I should mention that I picked this up last summer as a two pack (with the Rise & Fall of ECW Documentary) for only $4.99 at the local FYE (For Your Entertainment...basically a DVD/Music & other stuff kind of store) store in my local mall, so if you're near one of these stores, see if it's the wrestling section, because it's definitely worth the purchase!!
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