Friendly Competition 5.12.07
Posted by Sam Caplan on 05.12.2007
"Hey Vince, we've got this guy whose contract is running out and refuses to sign a new contract. What should we do with him?" "Give him to me, pal, and make it the main event." "Yes sir."
Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends, we're so glad you could attend, come inside, come inside! I'm back, and I've got more ECW and TNA than you can shake a stick at! Let's get right to it.
ECW On Sci Fi Results 5/8/2007
-The show opens with Bobby Lashley coming to the arena where he is confronted by Armando Alejandro Estrada, who is in a wheelchair and flanked by police officers. Armando tells Lashley that he is barred from the building tonight, and if he tries to enter or puts his hands on Armando again, he'll have him arrested. Lashley responds by sending Armando crashing into a dumpster, then turns to the cops and says "Well guyth, I gueth you have to arretht me now."
-Marcus Cor Von defeated CM Punk after working over the ribs the whole match and finishing with the Pounce. After the match, they spoil Smackdown by telling us that Edge defeated the Undertaker to win the World title. I wonder if this is going to translate to people who don't normally tune in watching the show to see the title change?
-Snitsky squashes Sandman in less than a minute with the Foot Fetish. Vince celebrates the ongoing destruction of the original ECW, and will continue that destruction later by beating Rob Van Dam.
-Hardcore Hobags do their shitty dance, during which time I join Michael Bauer for a bathroom break (though not together, because that'd be gay), and when I come back I see Elijah Burke lecturing Matt Striker for his loss the previous week to the Major Brothers, and he wants Striker at ringside for his match against Brian Major to show him how it's done.
-Elijah Burke defeats Brian Major, and then we go backstage to a tarot reading with Kevin Thorn and Ariel. Thorn informs us that his future was never in the New Breed, but in fresh blood. Ha ha, that was clever. Get it? New Blood, fresh blood? Watch out Kevin Nash, there's a new comedian in town!
-In the main event, Rob Van Dam challenged Vince McMahon (teaming with Shane McMahon and Umaga) for the ECW World Title. Shane actually looked pretty good here, but as you might imagine the odds were too much for Van Dam, and after taking a top rope splash and a Samoan Spike, Vince tagged in and scored the fall on Van Dam. So Rob, you don't wanna sign your contract, huh?
TNA Impact Results 5/10/2007
-Homicide wins a three way match against Scott Steiner and Brother Devon when Hernandez sneaks in behind the ref's back and gives Devon the Border Toss so the former ROH World Champion can score the win. Backstage after the match, Scott Steiner complains about how much Christian Cage and Tomko suck as partners, saying that would have never happened with his brother.
-VKM mock Christy Hemme some more backstage, but Hemme comes to the ring and announces that her team to face VKM at Sacrifice will be Basham and Damaja. Hemme's team immediately lays VKM out with chairs before Hoyt runs out for the save.
-Bob Backlund and the X-Division Job Crew have one of their silly segments backstage, leading to Alex Shelley and Chris Sabin defeating Jay Lethal and Sonjay Dutt. After the match, Backlund runs out and attacks Shelley and Sabin, who apparently stole his book.
-We get a three way interview with the participants in Sunday's NWA World Title match which sees Sting and Kurt Angle bickering back and forth over their problems in the weeks since Lockdown, and Christian Cage just eggs them both on and plays them off one another. That Christian, the master manipulator.
-AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, and James Storm defeat Chris Harris, Samoa Joe, and Rhino in the main event, after which Harris chases Storm into the crowd where they begin brawling, and then out attention is diverted to the entranceway where Angle and Sting are brawling as Cage comes out to watch and egg them both on some more.
Overall Top Ten Ranking
As voted by me. This ranking includes wrestlers from both groups, is done on a week by week basis, is based on a combination of how well they produce in the ring and how much they entertain me, and is entirely subjective.
ECW World Champion: Vince McMahon (Champion Since 4/29/2007)
NWA World Champion: Christian Cage (Champion Since 1/14/2007)
1)Marcus Cor Von
2)Homicide
3)James Storm
4)Alex Shelley
5)Elijah Burke
6)Chris Sabin
7)Gene Snitsky
8)AJ Styles
9)Christopher Daniels
10)CM Punk
Dickhead Of The Week: Chris Harris and James Storm
A rarity this week, as we have co-winners for DOTW. Chris Harris earns his spot because, after being attacked and put out of action for months by his backstabbing former partner James Storm, he finally returns to the ring and gets Storm in a match which, while totally overbooked and overgimmicked in the most retarded manner imaginable, was one in which he would at least theoretically have an advantage, but loses. Then he meets him again in this week's main event tag match and follows Samoa Joe Corollary #1, meaning he gets pinned in the middle of the ring one week before their return match at the next PPV. Storm, on the other hand, qualifies because despite the fact that he is now up 2-0 on his former partner, still runs from him every time he comes to the ring, and this was even back when Harris was "handicapped" with a bad eye. This Texas Death Match had better be like the most brutal match ever to make up for all this crap.
Vital Social Issues N' Stuff With Stuart
Even though ECW has improved a lot over the last three or four months, I still think it's interesting that their roster is so thin that they chose to main event this week's program with a guy they've already decided to start phasing out because he hasn't signed a new contract with them yet. The flipside to this, of course, is that they can probably do more to persuade Van Dam to stick around than have him job to Vince McMahon and Bobby Lashley. Granted, he lost in a 3-on-1 situation, but I don't think anyone seriously expected Van Dam to win the ECW World Title this week, and that's got a lot to do with the way he's been booked since he returned from his Wellness suspension last summer. If he has the option to get a better deal with TNA or make a living on the indies, then more power to him, but do you think that maybe this week is a sign that it's time to start building up some new main event babyfaces? (paging Punk, CM)
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Speaking of the ECW World Title, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that I love what they've been doing with Vince as the champion. A lot of people made comparisons to when he won the WWF Title in 1999 and voluntarily relinquished the title, but Vince was portrayed as more of a regular businessman back then and given how his character has progressed in the eight years since (damn, has it really been that long?), it made more sense to have him maniacally trying to ruin the legacy of ECW by holding the ECW World Title hostage in this manner. It's also booking a 61 year old man very well by having him do as little in ring work as possible, instead leaving the bulk of the wrestling to Umaga and Shane. Speaking of Shane, he really impressed me against Rob Van Dam in this week's match. Say what you will about him wrestling once a year, taking a huge bump, and then disappearing for another ten months, but the guy showed some real aptitude for wrestling with that exchange he and Van Dam had at the beginning of the match and actually looked like a guy who could believably hang in there. I really feel like that's a big reason why he's not as hated among smart fans as the rest of his family. I wonder if Stephanie would get over better if she learned to work and started taking insane bumps against Mickie James?
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I'm really starting to wonder if there's any kind of plan for Snitsky or if the whole plan for him just involves kicking people in the face and pinning them every week for the rest of time. I had originally thought that there were plans for him to feud with Bobby Lashley over the ECW Title after Wrestlemania, but that's not the way things played out. Then I thought that he was going to get into some kind of angle with Hardcore Hobags when he came out during their dance that one week, but that never developed into anything. I mean, if they really feel the need to put a guy who's not that great in the ring on TV, then they're doing a great job of protecting him while making him look like a monster, but if I wanted to watch a big stiff for laughs, I'd be tuning in to Raw to watch the Great Khali beat up John Cena and Shawn Michaels every week. At this point, Snitsky just comes off as a poor man's Khali, and what the hell kind of role is that to be stuck in?
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One of the things that is a trademark of every single Vince Russo booking regime is that he has this fixation with having guys who are wrestling each other face off in a tag match or multi-way match on the go-home episode of the show. This drives me crazy because a)I'm a purist who believes that PPV opponents should not touch one another until the PPV, and b)one of them will invariably pin the other regardless of the other partners. First of all, the way it works 99.99999999% of the time is whoever got the pin on TV is going to lose at the PPV, which takes all the intrigue out of the PPV match. The other thing is that if one of them pinned the other on TV, you already saw them go to a decision, so why buy the PPV? It really drives me up the fucking wall that they keep giving away this stuff, and this philosophy has continued in limited form to this day in WWE, eight years after Vince Russo left. The most glaring example I can think of is when Hulk Hogan pinned the Rock on Raw before they even got to Wrestlemania, and I knew right then and there that you might as well have just had Hogan go into Wrestlemania and lay down for all it mattered because the intrigue was gone. Now this is happening again in TNA, most recently with James Storm getting another fall on Chris Harris, although the FAR more offensive instance of this was a few months ago when Kurt Angle pinned Samoa Joe in that five-way match after little more than an Angle Slam. That's the other thing, is that due to the short duration of TNA's TV matches these days, having people go in and lose to the guy they're facing at the PPV makes them look like total pussies.
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Why is Bob Backlund still on my TV? Okay, the joke was amusing for the first two or three weeks, but he's really starting to wear out his welcome with me. I'm sure the guy is a big hit backstage because he acts like a weirdo or whatever, but what is being accomplished by having him around? Bob seems to be in really good shape, especially considering how old he is and all, but are they ever going to get around to actually having him wrestle or anything? I thought that he was eventually going to have a match with Austin Starr, but with him being suspended (blackballed is more like it), those plans seem to be out the door. Now it looks like they're going to do something with Backlund feuding with Chris Sabin and Alex Shelley, and while I'm sure this will lead to some really funny promos, is Backlund actually going to wrestle? He's a really accomplished mat wrestler and I'm sure that he would be able to put on a great match in ROH, but I really have to question how well his style will get over, especially if he's thrown into a situation where he's wrestling an X-Division guy like Sabin, Shelley, Starr, or whoever. Don't get me wrong, the X-Division guys can all wrestle very well (especially Shelley), but that's not what we're used to seeing out of them in TNA and probably not what management would expect out of them. I think any of those guys wrestling their TNA style against Backlund would be a total clash of styles and would just make Backlund look like an idiot when he's shooting ankle picks and waistlock takedowns while Sabin's hitting a springboard missile dropkick on him. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate good mat wrestling more than most people, but I really don't think it's going to appeal to the TNA crowd at all.
In all things, there is at least one lesson to be learned. Here I will impart upon you what I took away from the weekly television of ECW, TNA, and WSX. You too can learn important life lessons from Kevin Thorn and Maverick Matt, and are encouraged to send in your own revalations.
This week on ECW On Sci-Fi, I learned that...
-Michael Bauer and I take bathroom breaks at the same time.
-Sandman will job to anything that moves.
-Elijah Burke > Brian Major > Matt Striker.
This week on TNA Impact, I learned that...
-If you're a babyface, you should never wrestle your PPV opponent on the go home episode of Impact because you WILL get pinned.
-Scott Steiner probably still thinks Tomko is a better partner than Test.
-Samoa Joe is still a main eventer.
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That's it for me today, I'll be back tomorrow with The Ominous Thoughts News Report. Thanks for reading and I'll see you then.
