Gorman

I am surprised that neither Dave Logan, Reggie Rucker (Sipe years), Webster Slaughter nor Reggie Langhorne (Kosar years) pulled off that feat.

Yeah, I announced some MMA fights featuring "The Vanilla Gorilla" Nick Brashear. He has since hit the Cleveland indy wrestling scene.

I would challenge the Pistons on behalf of the team I announce for (ABA champion Burning River Buckets), but we're only 3-3 this year. We'll just concentrate on the Detroit ABA team.

"I told you I was very evil!"

SWERVE~! (Oops, wrong book) Actually, my ECW book needs to be even longer, so it's time to watch ALL of the "WWECW" TV shows. I didn't know that version of ECW lasted until early 2010! That should be good for three more chapters. I will hand out MVP awards for each quarter of the year.

Not to be nitpicky, but ROH doesn't have a Women's TV title.

Thoughts on December to Dismember This was much more of a "WWE C-brand show" than an ECW show. It featured a lot of new faces, and the Dreamer and Balls matches were not particularly extreme. At one point, fans started chanting "We want hardcore!" Despite Joey, Christian, and Julio graduating from the Pittsburgh scene where I was working to ECW, I was very surprised that CM Punk got hired by the WWE version of ECW. Not that he wasn't a good wrestler - it just didn't seem like WWE would give someone like Punk a chance. He wildly overachieved, and he opened the door for AJ Styles and Bryan Danielson to be taken seriously at the very top of WWE. This show had a very "thrown together" feel, with only the opener and main event announced in advance. In the opener, Joey Styles said that the Hardys (who went by "Team Extreme") and MNM might never appear in ECW again, and that the Hardys might never team up again! Indeed, Jeff was the Intercontinental champion at the time. Bobby Lashley has to be the MVP, beating Test and Big Show to win the ECW title in the Extreme Elimination Chamber. The fans didn't exactly give him a hero's welcome. As Paul Heyman said before the match, "The era of Sabu, Sandman, and RVD is over."

It was an accident that worked perfectly with the angle.

Thoughts on One Night Stand 2006 ECW fans warmly embraced Kurt Angle as one of their own as he beat Randy Orton. Big Show added another dimension to the ECW roster as he wrecked shop after the Crazy-Tajiri vs. FBI match. The fans booed World champion Rey Misterio Jr. just for representing Smackdown, even though he had “ECW” on the back of his mask. Rey Jr. vs. Sabu would have been mind-blowing if it had happened 10 years earlier. Terry Funk took a “61-year-old man falls off a giant ladder” bump. Mick Foley attacked his eye with barbed wire, but Funk came back with his head wrapped up like a Revolutionary War soldier and got revenge with a flaming barbed-wire 2x4. After winning that match, how did Edge get under the ring to interfere in the Cena-RVD main event? Why was he wearing a motorcycle helmet? Why did he help RVD win the title that he wanted to regain from Cena? This was my first time seeing the Eugene character. There may be a "right" way to portray a wrestler who is developmentally disabled, but this wasn't it. Despite Edge’s influential presence in the two most important matches of the night, RVD is the MVP. He wisely cashed in the Money in the Bank briefcase in the perfect environment to win and completed ECW’s rags-to-riches story by winning the WWE title. If ECW had gone off the air permanently at this point, it would have been the ultimate happy ending.

NJPW Strong = NJPW "USA"

TNA is going to get laughed at in every one of my books, because they laughed off my attempt to take the Gut Check Challenge, even though I was the play-by-play voice of Ring Of Honor.

I will finish up with One Night Stand 2006 and December to Dismember 2006.

If Punk is just announcing his brand, then how will he keep up his tradition of bad things happening to him whenever he comes to Cleveland?

Thoughts on One Night Stand 2005 This book needs to be longer, so let’s watch the three WWE shows under the ECW banner. Holy cow, this was one of the greatest PPVs ever. It exceeded expectations so much that it nullified the name of the show - ECW was too beloved to be left behind after a One Night Stand. Almost every match had historical significance (Storm-Jericho, Benoit-Guerrero), and they all delivered in the ring. ECW stood tall in the post-match brawl with the Raw and Smackdown invaders before Eric Bischoff got destroyed at the end. On commentary, Mick Foley explained that the reason we were watching an ECW reunion instead of a WCW reunion came down to one missing ingredient: Emotion. You felt it from Joey Styles to Paul Heyman to the fans. One year later at One Night Stand, ECW was back as the third WWE brand.

I call 1999 "The Year of Nonsense" in my WWF and WCW books, but I didn't use that phrase in the book I'm currently writing about ECW.

I looked at the scoreboard with 2 minutes left in the Men's Iron Survivor match and said to myself, "Well, I guess it isn't Trick's night."

I was there! The gas cans on the announce table set an ominous tone as soon as we walked into the building. The fans filed out quietly after the show, stunned that Austin had lost the title.

Lexy Nair is ring announcing! She deserves it.

QT also had a really good match with Metalik for the Latin American title to open the Cleveland Collision show. I think that ended up being a dark match.

That would be for the best, considering how things usually go for Punk in Cleveland (Gall, Moxley).

You had me at No. 6.

Sounds like they did it because it's an official name change. I was wondering why Britt Baker wasn't on the show. Usually, they make a big deal of her when they are in Pittsburgh.

It makes sense that with 8 to 10 wrestlers and two rings, there could be pinfall/submission attempts happening in both rings at the same time (or someone escaping the cage to forfeit the match).

Uncle Pepsi needs to cut the same "Why does everyone think I'm going to be a locker room cancer? I'm just here to make this company better" promo that the nWo did at no Way out 2002. If he's going to be in the wrestling business, I want him to be happy and healthy, not miserable and picking fights with his co-workers. He's a draw, and it doesn't matter what company he's in - it's good news for both companies if Punk fans are watching pro wrestling.