Revisiting the Feb. 18, 2000, Episode of "ECW on TNN!"

When unprotected chairshots, crypto-racist commentary and references to "RollerJam" ruled the world

By: Toxickas Shock
Toxickashock@gmail.com
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It's no secret that Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) is my all-time favorite pro wrestling promotion. Yes, other promotions have had better in-ring products, but as far as the general atmosphere, ambiance and attitude, nothing has EVER matched it — and probably never will.

The amazing thing is that, despite its huge impact on the culture and industry of pro wrestling as a whole, ECW — as we know it — barely lasted six years. And by 2000, the promotion was just a year away from going extinct altogether.

That's kind of the cruel irony of the tragicomedy that was ECW. Nothing expedited its demise more than just experiencing a MODICUM of mainstream success. Indeed, ECW getting a national cable deal with what was then The Nashville Network (TNN) pretty much sealed the promotion's doom; from there, the company just bleed money like a stuck pig — Paul Heyman's attempts to take the promotion to the next level, sadly, proved to be ECW's death sentence.

Of course, for a few months, though, the "ECW on TNN" era somed to hold a tremendous amount of promise. At the time, I'd DEFINITELY say that ECW was putting on a more enjoyable and entertaining product than either WCW or the WWF, and there was no denying that EC-Dub was glutted with talent. Hell, the company even managed to get a couple of its cult favorite heroes like Raven and The Sandman to return; it certainly didn't seem like a company that was just a few quarters away from insolvency.

Then spring 2000 arrived and ECW was dealt disastrous blow after disastrous blow. 

Until then, the company was able to absorb the loss of big names like The Dudley Boys. But then the floodgates opened and star attractions like Mike Awesome and Lance Storm were soon bound for WCW — and with the LITERAL face of the company, Rob Van Dam, sidelined with a leg injury for a couple of months, ECW limped into summer with one foot and at least two or three extra toes already in the sepulcher. 

To borrow a phrase from "The Fault In Our Stars" (and I'm pretty sure I'm the first person in history to ever use THAT movie as an analogy for ECW), the Feb. 18, 2000, edition of "ECW on TNN" could right be called one of the "last good days" for the promotion. Although you could certainly see some fissures and cracklines in the vessel, the general strength of the product would lead you to believe that the promotion could easily keep on trucking for years ...when, in reality, the company had less than a year left before it shuttered its doors forever.

Lance storm was rocking the cheese grater fu DECADES before "EVIL DEAD RISE."

The episode begins with the cameraman slinking his way into the "office" of Cyrus, the kayfabe TNN stooge who you might know better today as Don Callis. By the way, the "office" is literally just one corner of a bathroom somewhere. E-C-Dub, E-C-Dub!

Cyrus talks about Rob Van Dam breaking his leg (for real) and how the show's ratings keep tanking. Ultimately, all of this leads to RVD being stripped of the ECW Television Championship, which he had held for months and months. Cyrus concludes the three-minute(!) cold opening by pimping "RollerJam," which for those of you out of the loop, was the shittiest possible thing you could ever imagine.

After the show intro, we throw it to co-hosts Joey Styles and Joel Gertner, who waste no time at all before hard shilling for the recently released "Hardcore Revolution" video game. Yeah, that game pretty much sucked, but hey, the fact that ECW could even GET a video game deal with Acclaim (or any other publisher for that matter) was a miracle in and of itself. Gertner makes a joke about being "a muff stuffer" and it's time for a commercial break.

We return from the ads and we've got a tag team match on the docket. In one corner, it's the duo of Danny Doring and Roadkill and in the other it's Nova and Chris Chetti. You whippersnappers might know Nova better by his breief and lamentable stint in the WWE as fitness guru Simon Dean ... a character that, admittedly, had his moments.

Before the match begins, we get some comments from Masato Tanaka. Of course, most of it is in Japanese. And it isn't subtitled. So yeah.

Well, the tag match is a clusterfuck, just as you'd imagine. Nova is rocking a weird Green Lantern costume and Roadkill is a caricature of an Amish buggy driver or something. There's lots of brawling around the ring and absolutely zero semblance of psychology or selling, so if you like AEW, you'll probably love this (I kid, I kid.) Despite his pink and yellow singlet, Doring is probably the most respectably dressed man involved in this match. I don't even know HOW to describe Chetti's getup. Dude look more like he's dressed up to go clubbing then he is a fuckin' wrestling match.

Eventually Roadkill drags out a table and the fans go bananas. Naturally, Nova rolls out of the way at the last second before Roadkill crashes through it. Then Doring hits Chetti with his finisher — an implant DDT he calls "The Wham Bam Thank You Ma'am," for some inexplicable reason — and that'll get them the dub.

Post-bout, the ECW Tag Team champs Justin Credible and Lance Storm run into the ring and kick everybody's ass, just because they're such pricks. 

After a commercial break, we get a brief promo from ECW World Heavyweight champ Mike Awesome, who manages to use the word "ass" five times in a barely 40-second period. That includes the glorious line "well, I'm going to beat your ass and I'm going to give you an ass kicking that's Awesome."

He's gonna ass the ass out of your ass ... ASS!

Next on the docket, we've got C.W. Anderson taking on Super Crazy. Gertner quotes "A Few Good Men," for some reason, and then there's another commerical break.

We return to action and all in all, this isn't that bad of a little TV match for its timeframe. Super Crazy hits an Asai moonsault to the outside pretty early on in the bout, and then it's time for some chair swingin'. And there's Chekov's table. Styles makes fun of "Rockin' Bowl" ratings as Crazy pounds Anderson in the corner. C.W. puts S.C. through the table with a spinebuster, but he's too shaken up to go for the pin. Crazy hits a swinging DDT as a defensive counter (how often do you see that?) and then yet ANOTHER table enters the fray. And a couple of more chairs, 'cause why the hell not? Anderson eats steel, Crazy climbs the top rope and C.W. gets legdropped through the lumber. Crazy sets up ANOTHER table and yup, C.W. gets moonsaulted ... except the table DOESN'T break. This leads to one of the WERIDEST things I've ever seen in a wrestling match, where Crazy just throws the table on top of Anderson and moonsaults it again ... only he lands stomach first on the leg of thr furniture. Like, that motherfucker literally IMPALED himself on the table and refused to sell it. No wonder they call this dude "Super Crazy." Naturally, that'll be our finish, because the only way he can outdo that is if he decapitates himself on a ladder spot or something. 

Post-bout, Gertner makes TWO separate jokes about Elian Gonzalez, and yes, they're both racist as hell.

Alright, main event time. EVERY time Masato Tanaka and Mike Awesome throw down, you KNOW it's going to be a visceral, brain-rattling CTE-fest, and this match DOES not disappoint considering those lofty yet well-established expectations.

This bout barely goes 11 minutes but trust me, these two maniacs don't waste a single millisecond. There's just so much FORCE exerted when these two assholes go at it; when they put each other in headlocks, it looks more painful than most powerbombs through tables and shit.

It doesn't take long for this one to spill out onto the arena floor. Tanaka gets tossed over the ringside guardrail, which means Awesome has to sail over the barrier to plancha his ass. Mike grabs a chair and he goddamn WAFFLES Masato with it. Tanaka no sells the barrage and Awesome fucking powerbombs him for his bullshit. Masato is dropped by a HARD clothesline and that's Mike's cue to grab a table. There's a great counter-reversal-counter segment that concludes with Tanaka DDT-ing Awesome off the edge of the apron THROUGH the table. And that fucker is obliterated into like 20 or 30 pieces for real.

Masato conks Awesome over the noggin with a chair and follows it up with a missile dropkick for a two count. Masato uses the aforementioned chair to assist him on a flying elbow drop. Another two count. Masato goes for a tornado DDT, only for Mike to just ragdoll his ass back to the canvas. Then Awesome grabs a chair and goes flying, but Tanaka manages to dropkick him again at the last second. THEN Tanaka his the tornado DDT. A 2.99999 count right there. It even gets the crowd chanting "bullshit." Awesome catches Tanaka with a sitout powerbomb out of nowhere, and when that fails to get the dub, he climbs up top for a HUGE body splash. Masato, however, kicks out AGAIN.

Awesome pulls another table out from underneath the ring. Mike signals for another powerbomb, but Masato escapes and hits his patented "Roaring Elbow" strike. Awesome recovers, scales the top rope and he fucking ANNIHILATES Tanaka with a reverse sitout superbomb. And yep, that'll score him the three count.

And ... scene.

Everytime Masato Tanaka and Mike Awesome wrestled it was the human equivalent of two monster trucks operated by drunk drivers crashing into each other. You didn't just feel the force of all that man-meat mayhem, it's almost like you absorbed the second-hand blunt trauma as a viewer. With violence so visceral, they always made you feel more like a witness than a spectator; instead of conducting a symphony, these two lunatics did their best impersonations of brawling hydraulic presses. They had no desire to be artisic; brutality was their only language, and they spoke that shit fluently.

You could argue that Tanaka and Awesome have had better matches in ECW — and they have — but still, anytime those colosssal walking concussions locked horns it was TOP TIER shit. And the main event of this show, obviously, was no different. Granted, the rest of the show was more miss than hit, but it was pretty cool to go back and see how OVER Super Crazy was with the ECW faithful. When it came time to pinpoint RVD's successor as TV champ, it's no surprise that Paul H. put the crown on the "Insane Luchador" ... for a few weeks, anyway.

After Awesome left the company, ECW was pretty much stuck in a tailspin. Justin Credible was booked as a heel champ, but that did little to bolster the promotion's sagging box office. RVD would briefly return, only to take an extended hiatus when the checks started to bounce. Eventually, the company would end the year with Steve Corino, of all possible people, as its world champ; we got one PPV in January 2001, and by February of the same year, ECW, as we knew it, was no more.

That makes above-average episodes of "ECW on TNN" like the Feb. 18, 2000, edition such a bittersweet experence to relive. Sure, the promotion was on a downward trajectory, but ECW in nosedive-mode is still better than most promotions at their apex. Who'd thought the sounds of steel chairs clunking off skulls would ever sound so wistful, huh?

XOXO, Toxicka