Thank gawd for my TIVO!

Last Sunday night I set it up to record the ECW PPV "One Night Stand" and was able to watch it this past week in it's glorious return. However, before I get into it I'd like to go into some of my history with the ECW.

In 1992, the ECW started out as the Eastern Championship Wrestling and on August 27th, 1994 the "Eastern" was changed to "Extreme," and a third wrestling company was born.

In it's early stages I watched the ECW on late night television where it was broadcast like an infomercial, but it was so intense that I found myself waiting up past midnight every Saturday night to catch a glimpse of matches featuring guys like Shane "The Franchise" Douglas, Taz, Sabu, Rob Van Dam and the Dudley Boyz, along with some other serious talent that filled or fills the WWE roster today.

The ECW was in your face with ring violence, gorgeous women and music from the likes of White Zombie, NIN, Ice Cube and Dr Dre.

I was hooked, and at that time I was writing WWE (WWF back then) pieces for Wrestlenutz.com on a weekly basis under "Getting RAW with Sinista" and "Sinista delivers the Smackdown." Every week I would watch, and be envious of those in the New York and Philadelphia areas who were getting to see these events live.

Then one night, they announced their planned trip into the Massachusetts area. The ECW was coming to Waltham, a 45-minute ride from my home. I called up some buddies, ordered our tickets and waited for the fateful night when two carloads of us went to see the event, which just blew us away. It was an event that was full of heart, soul and crowd interaction, and when it was over they announced that they would be returning the following month.

A week before the second trip I contacted someone at ECW and told them that I was a writer for an internet wrestling website, and would like to be close to the action. The person on the phone told me who to see the night of the event and they would take care of me.

That next event my group was somewhat smaller, and the person who I was supposed to see set us up with ringside seats. This was a great night because Stevie Richards had returned to ECW after his stint as Raven's punk in the WCW went bust. During his match a partner of mine got the crowd going with the chant -- "Raven's bitch! " Stevie acknowledged this and kept the crowd going as he shot his displeasure.

These trips continued, and every month we got to know more and more of the ECW staff, and even witnessed how they handle a first class injury when Sabu broke his jaw and split his mouth open when he landed on the leg of a steel chair that had up-ended itself after he used it to jump onto the top rope. The surprising part of the night was that Sabu finished the match with nary a wince from the injury.

The memories grew, and then our trips to Waltham came to an end as they announced the hall they were using was being closed down, and they hadn't found a place to hold their events in New England. But we were told to keep watching since they would announce it during the televised show.

Three weeks later they announced they would be in Fall River, which was about 30 minutes from my house. The trips began again, and we witnessed the last Dudley Boyz match where it was rumored they were going to the WWE. No-one knew when or where that was going to happen.

That same week I had tickets to the very first broadcast of WWE's Smackdown, and in to everyone's surprise the second dark match (untelevised) was a tag team match featuring the Dudley Boyz. The crowd went nuts, and for the first time I heard ECW chants in the WWE. That night I couldn't wait to write my report when I got home.

This week, I felt the same way after watching the PPV, and decided to return to my roots writing about this great event.

Just one other quick note. The ECW is owned by the WWE, and this event had been promoted and built up on the WWE's weekly wrestling shows, but after this event the ECW showed some staying power, and had me wondering what Vince McMahon may do with this defunct group and its devoted fans.

The show opened with Joey Styles entering the ring to a thunderous chant of "ECW" and "Joey" the emotion in his face was there, and almost to the point of tears as he acknowledged the fans and brought out Mick Foley as his co-commentator. This brought another huge pop from the crowd as Mick Foley (aka Mankind/Cactus Jack) made his way to the booth.

The opening match featured Chris Jericho against Lance Storm who came to the ring with Dawn Marie who was obviously past her thin days, but still looked good. The match was great as these two shot the match with a nice mix of counters, moonsaults, reversals and both men delivering great flying dropkicks. In the end Lance Storm won with help and interference from his Impact Player faction Justin Credible and Jaysun.

Pitbull Gary Wolfe shot a promo spots that paid it's respect to those who couldn't be there including the recent Chris Candido.

Match two brought Tajiri, Mikey Whipwreck and Sinister Minister to the ring for a three way dance featuring Tajiri against Little Guido and Super Crazy. Super Crazy came to the ring alone, but Little Guido was carried to the ring on the shoulders of Big Guido and members of the FBI (Full Blooded Italians) Tony Marmaluke, Tommy Smothers and JT Smith.

Another match that was well shot, but I knew it would end up with Tajiri and Super Crazy, as the final two long before Super Crazy did a backwards moonsault from a balcony 30 feet up into the FBI who awaited below. Tajiri was able to spew his green mist, but lost the match to Super Crazy.

Another promo showed the early bouts in the ECW.

The next match had been done over and over in the former WCW, but I never tired of seeing the two combatants since they always put out a great effort. Psicosis came to the ring and removed his mask ready to take on Rey Mysterio. This match was a great Luchador bout with Rey Mysterio coming out on top, but I think Psicosis stole the thunder with his guillotine leg drop from atop of the turnbuckle as Rey hung over the guardrail below.

At the end of this match the WWE Smackdown crew arrived to their seats, and received some serious heat from the ECW fans chanting "F**k you Smackdown!" Joel Gertner even got into the action as Kurt Angle and JBL built up and played on the heat they were getting.

At one point, the crowd chanted to Angle -- "You suck d**k!," as he answered -- "You're mother taught me!," something he could never say on a WWE televised show. Then, just when you thought the promo shoot couldn't get any better RVD came out with Bill Alphonso, and gave an emotional speech on how the ECW One Night Stand event was his idea and how he proposed it to McMahon.

He talked about how the date was set and could not believe he was standing in the ring and acknowledged that the fans were the true reason for ECW's success. He also lashed out at the WWE writers for making him generic with no vocabulary and reminded the fans how long he held the TV title, what RVD:420 meant, and how he was once called "the whole f**kin show" and "Mr. Monday night."

RVD almost broke down when he told the crowd how he just had surgery on his left knee, and wasn't cleared to wrestle, exclaiming that it sucked more than missing the WWE overseas tour, and Booker T's wedding.

Then without warning Rhyno rushed the ring and took it to RVD. During the beating the lights went dark and the crowd went almost silent. When the lights came on Rhyno was still in the ring, but RVD was gone and in his place Sabu stood glaring as the crowd went crazy. A ref jumped into the ring and the match got under way.

The Sabu and Rhyno match was pretty much all Sabu who hit most of his trademark ring moves, even RVD got a pop when he skateboarded a steel chair into the face of Rhyno as he sat crumbled in the ring corner. The ring ended after Sabu put Rhyno through a table with an Arabian Skull Crusher.

Al Snow with Head shot the next promo with more ECW Highlights and after the promo Eric Bischoff and the Raw Goons arrived. Joey Styles called on the crowd to hide their wives as Edge made his way to the seating area following Eric Bischoff. Gertner returned begging Bischoff for a job and got some serious heat from the ECW fans.

The next match featured a match that they plugged as the match Paul Heyman always wanted, but didn't happen until these two got to the WCW. Chris Benoit (my favorite underrated wrestler) took on Eddie Guerrero in a great match, but didn't get much pop since they followed a great shoot by the previous match and the fans assulting Edge with chants of "I f**ked Lita," "She's got herpes," and "You screwed Matt," meaning her ex Matt Hardy. During the match Benoit nailed some serious German suplexes, one after another and scored the victory after putting Eddie away with his famous cross face crippler.

The next match to me was one of those matches you thought it was going to be the worst of the night and turned out to be one of the top three. Mike Awesome took on Masato Tanaka, and to be brutally honest Mike Awesome's physique wasn't so awesome anymore, but that didn't stop him as he delivered several chair shots to Tanaka.

When Awesome pulled tables from under the ring the match got interesting as Tanaka DDT'd Awesome through a table then Awesome slammed Tanaka through a damaged table which was real close to causing an injury. Mike Awesome won the match by awesome bombing Tanaka through a table from the ring to the floor, and then he leapt over the top rope and pinned Tanaka for the win.

Now it was time for Paul Heyman to come out and shoot his promo, and boy did it payoff once he got past the emotion of discussing the early beginnings of ECW and how it grew into a household name. Paul laid the WWE Superstars to waste verbally delivering some off color remarks to Edge and his involvement with Lita (he mentioned Matt Hart), Eric Bischoff, Kurt Angle, and got a great pop when he told JBL that the only reason when he was so successful on Raw was because Triple H didn't want to work Tuesday nights. After leaving the ring to a huge fanfare the main event got under way.

The Dudley Boyz came to the ring minus Spike, Sign Guy, and the recently deceased Big Dick Dudley to take on the "Innovator of Violence," Tommy Dreamer, who walked with an obvious bad back and Sandman whose appeared on the second tier swilling beer amongst the fans as Metallica's "Enter Sandman" bellowed from the sound system. It took the entire song for Sandman to get to the ring.

The combatants to be gave props to each other and got ready to do battle until music began blaring from the sound speakers bringing Stevie Richards, The Blue Meanie and Hollywood Nova (aka The BWO) to the ring. Stevie Richards grabbed the mike and announced how they can't have an ECW hardcore match without the BWO being involved.

Then on cue, AC DC's "Big Balls" comes on and to the ring comes Axle and Balls Mahoney with steel chairs sans mikes. They hit the ring and the battle erupts and carries on until the BWO take their beef with Axle and Balls to the back leaving the Dudleys, Dreamer and Sandman to give the crowd what they want. Mayhem ensued, Beulah showed up, as did Francine and a catfight ensured, then Sandman's Singapore cane got put to use, while Dreamer took the cheese grater to Bubba Ray's forehead letting the blood flow.

At one point during the match I saw the return of the cookie sheet, and barbed wire, which was used to inflict damage on Tommy Dreamer. The blood was flowing and the crowd was getting what they wanted, it all came to a huge climax when Spike Dudley made his way to the ring with his pockets full of lighter fluid. The Dudley's took control of the match, brought a table into the center of the ring, covered it with lighter fluid and ignited it to a huge crowd pop. As the table burned the Dudley's drove Tommy Dreamer through the flaming table with a 3D to win the match.

The Dudley's celebration was short as the Sandman entered the ring swinging his Singapore cane and he tended to his tag team partner. He looked down at the bloodied and burned Dreamer and began screaming for a beer. At this time Joey Styles and Mick Foley wondered why he would be screaming for a beer and said a doctor would be better for the situation.

Then to the fans delight, the sound of glass shattering blared through the loud speakers as "Stone Cold" Steve Austin came to the ring to a tremendous pop. Austin gave Sandman a beer, grabbed a mike and called all of the ECW wrestlers from the back for a beer. The entire ECW made it's way to the ring to a great ovation, but before Austin started handing out the beers he shot to the WWE guys in attendance and challenged them to come to the ring by the count of 10 or they would have to face the wrath of him going up to their seats and slapping every last one of them in the mouth.

He sat down at ring side and began his count, the WWE guys made their way to the ring with Angle being the first one through the ropes. The crowd went crazy with visions of the "invasion" once more, and just before the two groups collided the music blared from the speakers once again.

This time it was Tazz with the trademark towel over the head and that menacing look in his eyes. Tazz jumped into the ring, and immediately locked it up with Angle as all hell broke loose. Angle and Tazz took their fight outside the ring while the ECW guys with Al Snow and Pit-bull 1 took it to the WWE guys because it was their night.

The ECW cleared the ring as I had expected it to end, but Stone Cold got back on the mike and had Mick Foley drag Eric Bischoff to the ring since he had been commentating with Foley after driving Styles from the booth. Once he got delivered to the ring and 3D'd, Stone Cold allowed everyone he screwed over in WCW a shot at the former boss.

Chris Benoit was first as he nailed Bischoff with a flying head butt from the turnbuckle post, and then they set Bischoff up to get the 619 from Rey Mysterio. Stone Cold asked Bischoff if he still felt the ECW was dead, and he replied with a censored answer. Stone Cold brought Eric to his feet and nailed him with a stunner.

The crowd popped as the Dudley's carried Bischoff from the ring leaving the remaining wrestlers to swill beer with their fans cheering to the end leaving them, and me, entertained for the evening, but wondering where this must leave the ECW in the mind of Vince McMahon.