Migs

A good example of a real left turn to continue a feud that otherwise might have run its course. This is totally different than a standard Hardyz-E&C match, and while it's not a particularly exciting match, it allows them to reuse the pairing without burning out their style of match even further. Smart bit of booking, and some nice comedy.

I actually don't think this was quite as bad as the Undertaker squashes, but it's still definitely indicative of the way the WWF treated anyone below the very top as cannon fodder at times, which would bite them quite a bit when they tried to transition those guys up the card.

The big difference between this and the nWo infighting is that they're actually doing the right matches. The nWo angle never pays off with most of the obvious rivalry matches, like Nash v. Hogan. Extra points obviously for the matches delivering to varying degrees so far.

Excited to see some more babyface Corino. He's pretty over here - not RVD well, but he's getting a great reaction. I enjoyed Dawn complaining to Gabe about the upskirt shots. Corino shows really great fire at the start here. I like that these guys take their time a bit and don't rush through things - it's not a deliberate pace, but they're giving fans the time to react to what's happening. This builds into something pretty fun. Liked the finish too, as CW looked strong in the match and gets a bit of help but not a crazy amount.

Oddly okay wrestling sequence at the start, although it's clearly not Angel's strength. RVD is really in the cruising phase here, as even his dive doesn't look very good. The Baldies work reasonably well here - as they'd mostly darn garbage brawls, I was pleasantly surprised. But there's really zero heat here, as there were for most RVD matches in 2000. Hot tag into a long series of spots, although I did like some of the RVD/Kash double team stuff. Okayish way to kill time, which is sort of a metaphor for ECW itself at this point.

This goes almost immediately into a crappy crowd brawl, which seemed like a pretty poor use of Lynn. And then we get back to the ring and Rhino slows it right down. More chin lock, a ref bump, Cyrus interference, oh, and the heel referee. Yikes.

Watching the FBI against a few different teams over the last few months of matches, you can see that they're becoming a really great 80s style heel team, where they have a base match they can plug anyone into and have a good match. Obviously, Mikey and the minister add a fun element as well. Mikey does a ton of the work here, although Psic does contribute a nice dive. Psic felt really lethargic on the hot tag. Sal took an awesome bump there, and I like the choice to go right to the finish after that, because that was definitely going to be the high point of the match.

Reil is one of the lingering late-90s indy dudes, but he hangs here with Ki. Love Ki's version of the tarantula with the legs wrapped around the head. Reil is willing to accept Low Ki's stiffness and fires back with some really nice suplexes. The finish was super confusing, though. Solid match, and another in a series from Ki. I was wondering what happened to Reil, and apparently his career got derailed when he had a pretty bad shoulder injury later this year. I love this line from his Wikipedia page, though - "By this time, Reil was single-handedly responsible for establishing the careers of Low Ki, Trent Acid, Homicide and Nick Berk." Yeah... sure, pal. He also had a Twitter account named "BillyReilWWE" that has apparently been suspended. But if you have some desire to see what Billy Reil says on twitter to get people to talk to him... https://twitter.com/thebillyreil

This match shows the advantage of having a strong tag team division, as you can put two singles main eventers with tag teams and boom, TV main event. You can see the difference in governess when the crowd chants for The Rock during the heat segment - he's who they want to see, as much as they may dig Jeff Hardy. Solid match with a very hot finish.

One of the nice upsides to this angle - you can do the same match they've been doing for six months but there's a new twist added with the Dudleyz going for the masks. Ross and King are really great on commentary here, particularly King's GOAL!!! call of the win.

The tag match here is fairly generic, but the Conquistador gag is really amusing.

These six have really fun tag matches together. There's just so many little bits they can do that they can put together a really nice match in a few minutes. Solid stuff for a match that's really just there to advance the Angle, uh, angle.

I'd totally forgotten they used the spear off the ladder here, which would end up being a signature spot from TLC 2. Much like the cage match the night before, they'd pushed things so far with the big matches that this feels slightly lacking in that context, despite it being a pretty solid ladder match for any other pair of teams. I don't mind the slow climbing as much here because they've already established that both teams are pretty hurt from the night before. The big mistake here is putting the spear spot too early, as it's the high point and they needed to get to the finish faster after it. I did like the finishing spot, though. Solid performance from both teams, and a really amazing two days when you combine the effect of both big stip matches.

I like the way that Jeff gets eliminated early in an accidental way - it plays on the first guy leaving usually being a mistake of strategy in these types of matches and avoids that psychology pitfall. Jeff's constant attempts to get back in backfiring feels appropriate too, and plays into his character of being reckless - the chair ends up in the cage used by E&C, he knocks Christian out of the cage with the ladder, and even the big spot knocks out both Edge and Matt. That said, these two teams had set the spot bar so high that this feels slightly underwhelming at points. I did like the finish being the Hardyz swiping E&C's finisher, and the right team won, as the Hardyz were getting to the point where a loss would have marked them in a negative way. I don't do star ratings most of the time, but this feels shy of **** but not by a ton.

The E&C promo beforehand is amusing but feels pretty derivative of the midget gag from a few weeks ago (which wasn't that creative to begin with). The setup of the cage match is similar to Foley setting up TLC, but feels less organic here as well, as it's not totally clear what the cage solves in this angle. I thought this was a bit better than a throwaway six man but still too short to be much. They almost totally abandon a structure here, which is for the best, since putting structure on a four minute match usually feels forced.

Having gone to a couple of ROH shows in the last few months, the difference in energy for stuff involving the Elite and the stuff that does not is palpable. ROH is really dependent on them. I think they realize that - they position all those guys well and are starting to build the TV show around the Bullet Club drama.

There is a big lucha convention in Vegas that weekend - so some guys might be stateside, but also might be tied up.

Interesting bit of business, as Angle lets Daniels take basically the whole match, and Daniels looks pretty good in the process. Liked the reversals leading to the finish. Nice to see Angle keep selling past the bell.

Lost my comments on this to a browser era, but want to point out how nuts it is that Mack doesn't bother to let Mace get out of the way of the powerbomb through the table. Just a wild moment.

I haven't watched all the IWA stuff, so maybe people have commented on this elsewhere - but holy hell is that ref in the sparkly shirt distracting. Suicide Kid looks like he rode up to the show on an ATV. Match starts in an exceptionally basic way with the focus on the headscissors. The transition to the bigger spots feels a little clunky because of how slow the start is, but it works well enough. Kid's offense is definitional early 2000 indy stuff. The botch on the tombstone reversal is pretty ugly, but they cover it reasonably well and move forward. Punk doesn't do a ton but looks solid here.

Definitely my favorite match of this show, as this did a nice job of being exactly what it needed to be. They cut to the brawling, get a bit of heat on Willy, have a nice series of big moves and then the crowd pleasing finish. It didn't prolong the brawling (which some of these ECW six mans have definitely been guilty of), everyone got to show their stuff, and it was the right length.

I found this terribly disappointing, particularly on Kash's end, as it felt he just didn't rise to the occasion here. Kash has had some good matches this year, but generally in shorter matches. This isn't even particularly long, a little less than 10 minutes, and he just didn't have anything to add to the spots to take it up a level. One of the weaker matches Psic has had in ECW.

Interesting to watch this compared to the WWF TV tags I've been watching the past few days, as even as 8 minutes or so this felt a lot more fully realized than almost all the TV tag matches. Matthews and York do a nice job of providing some structure here, as Doring and Roadkill are super over but are basically just a series of big moves. During and Roadkill are two of the guys that maybe got the most hurt by the end of ECW, as they were so over with that crowd but never really found the right venue for themselves afterwards to really develop their work further.

Match here is just an excuse for the run-in, but it does nicely set-up the PPV rematch with the Hardyz and provide the crowd some nice high spots (although that 3D was real ugly).

The E&C-Rock verbal battle was real enjoyable. E&C seem like they are in a way higher spot than they were a month ago. Match is a fun bit of business, as Rock is great as the selling babyface in this sort of context.