[1996-10-05-ECW-Ultimate Jeopardy] Shane Douglas vs Pit Bull #2

[PeteF3]

Not to complain about things no one can control, 5 years after the fact, but this is one of the bigger misses of the '96 Yearbook and one ECW segment that absolutely should have been on, at the expense of one of the more superfluous Pulp Fictions or something. Shane bumps around like a pinball before dropping Pit Bull with a swinging neckbreaker and a piledriver, as Francine implores him to "break his neck just like you did to Gary!" Francine as a trashy Jersey shore bitch is more fun than I remembered. Pit Bull gets his hands on her and makes her beg before dropping her with a powerslam...which may have had some impact if she hadn't eaten a fucking Superbomb the same day she turned on them. Douglas blinds Pit Bull with powder and he does one of the most comically bad sell jobs of blindness you'll ever see, before getting dropped with the single-arm DDT and strangled with the dog collar.

 

The match itself is pretty much nothing, but of course that's not the story. With the referee having been taken out by the blinded #2, a haloed Gary Wolfe at ringside takes it upon himself to try to stop Douglas' assault. Douglas responds by grabbing him by the protective halo, shaking it, and throwing him to the mat. Everyone in the ECW Arena who had been sitting down suddenly vaults to their feet and there's a palpable hush and state of disbelief over the crowd, who can't even think of a clever chant in response. Tod Gordon, Paul E., the referees, the undercarders, and Joey Styles immediately hit the ring and somebody even hops the barricade, prompting a response from the security guard we've all seen. Douglas is escorted out of the arena, possibly for his own legitimate safety.

 

In a clever touch, the Eliminators and Taz are seen backstage and they actually approve of Douglas' actions--a nice little add-on to keep this from being too excessively shooty-shoot. Joel Gertner has the audacity to bother announcing that Douglas is still the champion, earning him a punch from Tod Gordon and another fun chaotic scene. After that breaks up, Gertner tries the announcement AGAIN, and this time it's Paul E. who tackles him. We go off air with the shot of an ambulance heading away from the Arena.

 

One of the best ECW segments since Fonzie at his peak, or the Sandman blindness angle. Like the Sandman angle this played upon real emotions and the belief that what this crowd was seeing was real--the Wolfe injury was 100% shoot and the crowd all knew it. The only thing they didn't know was what he was still wearing the halo even though he only needed it for 6 weeks. It sort of pales in comparison to the work Hollywood Hogan is doing, but Douglas at long last is developing into the type of killer heel befitting his reputation among hardcores, instead of an annoyance only good for overlong promos.