ECW had been hitting it's all-time popularity from 1995 all the way through 1998 with the amazing stars and ECW Originals that the company had at the time in Tommy Dreamer, Sandman, Sabu, Taz, Shane Douglas, Bam Bam Bigelow, The Dudley Boyz, Spike Dudley, Balls Mahoney, New Jack, and Rob Van Dam along with some recent newcomers in Justin Credible, Lance Storm, Al Snow, F.B.I., Chris Candito, Steve Corino, and Jerry Lynn among others.
One of the top performers in ECW in 1998 and without a doubt its most popular was Rob Van Dam (RVD). RVD spent 1997 in feuds with ECW legends Dreamer and The Sandman over his desire to wrestle on either the WWF or WCW as he was nicknamed "Mr. Monday Night." He was one of the most despised wrestlers in ECW among the Hardcore fans and the Hardcore legends.
However, RVD's amazing performance in the ring with his high-flying aerial assault and martial arts moves along with his laid back mannerisms of a stoner really got over well with the fans and the fans began cheering RVD in 1998. They would chant "RVD" all night as he would point at himself with both his thumbs.
Van Dam also was nicknamed "The Whole Fuckin' Show!" He would still go by "Mr. Monday Night" but it would also be "Mr. Tuesday Night" if he wrestled on Tuesday and "Mr. Wednesday Night" on Wednesday night and so on and would even go "Mr. Pay-Per-View" when he was on a PPV.
Van Dam still teamed up with Sabu and their manager Bill Alfonso while going after singles gold. Van Dam and Sabu encountered The Triple Threat (Shane Douglas, Bam Bam Bigelow, and Chris Candito) to further solidify their babyface status and newfound popularity.
On April 4, 1998, RVD defeated Bigelow to win the ECW World Television Champion in my hometown of Buffalo, NY from the Burt Flickinger Center at the Erie Community College (ECC) City Campus. RVD did a move where he made a flying somersault jumping off a steel chair from the ring all the way to the audience on top of Bigelow.
Bigelow won the title the month before from Taz at Living Dangerously. There would be a rather infamous moment in the match as Taz put Bigelow in his Tazmission. As Taz was on his back, the 400 lb. Bigelow fell backwards with Taz on his back and they went right through the ring!!!
ECW started coming to Buffalo in late 1997 and started coming regularly in 1998 all the way to its demise in 2001. Every event in Buffalo was ECC's Burt Flickinger Center as it became one of the best crowds perhaps outside of Philadelphia and the other ECW original locations.
ECW even held one PPV (1999 November to Remember) and two shows on ECW on TNN. For those of you like me from the 716 remember all this you are welcome. Those from Buffalo in those days remember watching ECW Hardcore TV Saturday nights at midnight on MSG and then Saturday mornings on the now-defunct but awesome Empire Sports Network.
RVD's TV Title win made Sabu jealous and he wanted a title match against his teammate and friend. They fought to a 30-minute time limit draw at Wrestlepalooza '98 where RVD retained the title. RVD and Sabu patched things up and teamed up again and defeated Lance Storm and Chris Candito to win the ECW World Tag Team Championships, making RVD a double champion.
RVD defended the titles like a double champion as sometimes he would wrestle twice a night defending both the TV and Tag Team Titles on the same show. One of Van Dam's successful TV Title matches was against Jerry Lynn as this would not be the last time you would see these two in the ring.
Van Dam would hold the TV Championship the rest of the year. He became the greatest TV Champion in ECW history as he was the longest-reigning TV Champion in ECW history at 700 days or 23 months. RVD did not even lose the title in a match as he was forced to vacate it after breaking his leg in March 2000. He was by far the longest reigning champion of any of ECW's three major championships.
RVD and Sabu won their second ECW World Tag Team Championship late in 1998 against The Dudley Boyz, but 1998 would be a big year for The Dudley Boyz, Buh Buh Ray and D-Von Dudley. Buh Buh joined ECW in 1995 as part of The Dudley Family.
Buh Buh was a big, fun-loving, stuttering, goofball character that danced to the crowd's delight and the dismay of the leader of the family Big Dick Dudley and D-Von, who was hostile towards his "family" for their actions. In 1997, Buh Buh turned heel and joined his brother D-Von. He threw all the other Dudleys out except Big Dick and Sign Guy Dudley.
Unlike his dancing lovable babyface character, the heel Buh Buh was one of the most nastiest and hostile heels in pro wrestling history. Buh Buh was very hostile towards the audience where he would say some of the most vicious things a wrestler could ever say to a member of the audience. He would almost incite riots. Here's a couple of infamous promos by Buh Buh: 1. 2. 3. 4.
From the get go, The Dudley Boyz dominated and owned the tag team division as they won the ECW World Tag Team Championships a record eight times during their run in ECW, establishing themselves as the greatest tag team in ECW history.
The Dudleys would adopt a gimmick where they would put their opponents through tables, sometimes lighting the tires on fire, with powerbombs as well as their finishing move the Dudley Death Drop (also known as "3D").
The Dudley Boyz even had a manager in former ring announcer Joel Gertner. Gertner was also their own personal ring announcer as he hyped up the Dudleys and mocked their opponents by reciting poetry that ofter ended up with him saying something graphic and sexual, often getting himself beaten up by them. He even "injured" his neck in an attack and wore a neckbrace for the rest of his time in ECW.
Gertner nicknamed himself "The Quintessential Stud Muffin" as well as "Studly Dudley." He believed he was this attractive ladies man sex object even though he was overweight and hairy. He would usually wear a tuxedo coat with no shirt underneath and a bowtie around his neckbrace.
The Dudleys even teamed with their youngest brother Little Spike Dudley, who was considered the runt of the family. They always bullied and picked on poor Spike since he was the runt until they betrayed him and attacked him. Spike retaliated by teaming up with Tommy Dreamer, The Sandman, Axl Rotten, and Balls Mahoney to take on the Dudley clan.
To really show how big of heels they were, The Dudley Boyz "broke" the neck of Dreamer's girlfriend Beulah McGillicutty by giving her a 3D through a table. This was to write Beulah off TV as she no longer wanted to be in wrestling. This started a feud with Dreamer and The Sandman joined in along with Spike Dudley often teaming with Dreamer and Sandman.
This was not the first time Beulah was attacked as earlier in the year as relative newcomer Justin Credible attacked her and put her out of commission, starting a feud with Dreamer. Credible was Peter Polaco.
Polaco was first known as jobber "P.J. Walker" and then as the masked "Portuguese Man 'O' War" Aldo Montoya (playing off his Portuguese ancestry as his parents were from Portugal) in the WWF. Polaco was an associate member of "The Kilq" as he was great friends with Kliq member Sean Waltman.
Polaco shaved his head bald, grew a goatee, wore more grunge clothes like ripped jean shorts as he looked like a cross between Stone Cold Steve Austin and Raven as he called himself "Justin Credible." Credible was this cocky disrespectful asshole punk. He was managed by Jason Knight, had a valet Chastity, and had the massive Nicole Bass as his bodyguard.
Credible was perhaps the most despised ECW wrestler ever. Fans always chanted "Justin Asshole" due to his asshole attitude. Credible though was my favorite wrestler ever in ECW. He might have had the best theme music in ECW as it was clearly my favorite especially seeing it live.
As mentioned Credible started a feud with the "Innovator of Violence" Tommy Dreamer after attacking his valet Beulah as well as mocking Dreamer's dead grandfather after The Sandman gave his grandfather a 10-bell salute. Beulah returned at Dreamer's side as Dreamer attempted to take Credible out.
Credible defeated Dreamer in a First Blood match at the CyberSlam PPV in February but lost to Dreamer at Living Dangerously the following month when his former rival Mikey Whipwreck attacked him. He feuded with Whipwreck as well as Jerry Lynn, with whom Credible had incredible matches with Lynn in the summer of 1998.
After his feud with Lynn, Credible started a new feud with the Hardcore Icon The Sandman over Credible's lack of respect to the veterans. With help from his entourage, Credible beat the hell out of The Sandman with Sandman's own Singapore Cane.
Credible's feud with The Sandman abruptly ended in the fall when Sandman left ECW to join WCW for a lot more money. Credible would take credit for running Sandman out of ECW and even took his Singapore Cane and would use it himself, including canning the hell out of Tommy Dreamer as he restarted his feud with Dreamer. Credible also teamed with Jack Victory in his feud with Dreamer.
Dreamer and a mystery partner took on Credible and Victory at November to Remember '98. Everyone assumed the mystery partner would be Dreamer's mentor Terry Funk but it was Jake "The Snake" Roberts. Funk attacked Dreamer for not choosing him.
Credible soon had Funk align himself with Credible as Dreamer was distraught. Funk cost Dreamer his matches against Credible including A Stairway To Hell match at the Guilty as Charged PPV in January 1999.
One of ECW's most popular performers ever was Al Snow, who was sent down by Vince McMahon and the WWF to ECW as part of McMahon's talent exchange program with Paul Heyman and ECW. Snow struggled with various mid-card roles as the masked Avatar, the ninja Shinobi, and Leif Cassidy as a teammate to Marty Jannetty as part of "The New Rockers."
Snow's ECW gimmick was that of a schizophrenic caused by his lack of success and he would be talking to a mannequin head simply known as "Head." He had "help me" written backwards on his forehead as well as on Head's.
This gimmick caught on very well with the fans as they would shout "Head" over and over when Snow came out and his music "Breathe" by Prodigy played. Fans would be given styrofoam mannequin heads at ECW events and would throw the styrofoam heads into the ring before the match started.
Snow wrestled Shane Douglas for the ECW World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlepalooza but lost. Some reports were that Paul Heyman was getting ready to put the ECW World Title on Snow before Vince McMahon called Snow back up to the WWF at the end of 1998. Snow would take Head with him and continued the gimmick in the WWF.
Sunny, Tammy Lynn Sytch, left the WWF in the middle of 1998 and came to ECW to be with her boyfriend Chris Candito. Candito was feuding with his tag team partner Lance Storm. Storm retaliated by unveiling his new valet "Tammy Lynn Bytch" to mock Sytch.
Tammy Lynn Bytch was a beautiful hot woman Dawn Marie Psaltis, who was only to be in ECW for a few weeks but ultimately became Storm's full-time valet. Her name was changed to "Dawn Marie Bytch" to simply Dawn Marie. Dawn Marie stayed in ECW until its demise in 2001 and she went to the WWF a year later.
"The Franchise" Shane Douglas began 1998 as ECW World Heavyweight Champion and remained the promotion's top champ throughout the entire 1998 year. There was a reason why Douglas got to keep the title for the entire year as he suffered an elbow injury which prevented him from wrestling yet he kept his title. Douglas would do color commentary alongside Joey Styles while on the shelf.
This pissed off Taz who was the number one contender to Douglas' title yet could not wrestle him because of Douglas' injury and felt Douglas was ducking him. Taz responded by creating the "FTW" (Fuck the World) Heavyweight Championship.
Taz unveiled the title at It Ain't Seinfeld on May 14, 1998. It Ain't Seinfeld was an event held on the same night as the Seinfeld series finale. The FTW Title was actually Taz's old ECW TV Title belt with the custom orange leather strap. "FTW" was taped over the word "Television." This was not an official belt but he defended the title as the "real world champion."
Taz feuded with Douglas' Triple Threat. He faced Bam Bam Bigelow at Heatwave '98 and just like at Living Dangerously where they went through the ring, this time they went through the entrance ramp. Taz teamed with former rivals Sabu and Rob Van Dam to defeat the Triple Threat at November to Remember '98, but Taz was mad at Sabu for stealing his thunder by pinning Douglas.
Douglas got the irate Taz to injure Sabu so Sabu could not challenge him for the World Title at 1999's Guilty as Charged PPV. Taz destroyed Sabu and broke his neck when he Tazplexed him through a table on December 19, 1998.
However, Taz pulled Sabu on top of him for the pin to win Taz's FTW Championship. However, The Franchise's plan backfired as Taz would take Sabu's place at Guilty as Charged and defeated him to win the World Title.
Increased PPVs (4 in 1997 to seven in 1998) and increased markets made ECW grow but they were beginning to suffer financial hardships as they could not keep up with the more financially sound WWF and WCW.
ECW would soon see their best wrestlers jump to either promotion for more money and financial stability. ECW began searching for and found network TV in 1999 but it ironically did not help only hurt the promotion which helped lead to its demise a couple years later.
It can be said the WWF Attitude Era and success in 1998 which helped save the company was influenced heavily by the hardcore unorthodox style of ECW. Without the attitude of ECW there would be no Attitude Era. There would be no D-Generation X and heck, the biggest star Stone Cold Steve Austin honed his excellent promo craft in a brief stint in ECW.
The WWF also created a Hardcore Championship to coincide with the hardcore style of ECW wrestling. These matches were falls count anywhere and I mean anywhere outside or heck, not even in a building where a WWF event was being held. These tactics soon got the WWF over WCW and soon put them out of business and bought them out in 2001.
All of the top stars in ECW remained through 1998 which made the product so entertaining. However, the ability to keep up with the rising salaries and what these wrestlers were worth and wanted along with ECW generating nowhere near the revenue needed to keep the stars put as the WWF and WCW were calling.
Financial difficulties saw the top stars being owed money and leaving ECW in 1999 and 2000 which ultimately ended what is considered to this day a massive cult following.
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