The Moments That Killed Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW)

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Some possibilities off the top of my head:
-The Nashville Network TV deal: ECW was supposed to finally hit it big-time and be a legitimate contender against WCW (which was on TBS & TNT at the time) and WWE (which was on the USA Network at the time) w/ a major TV deal. But TNN seemed to be out to bury ECW from the very start. TNN put it in a bad time-slot (Fridays at 8:00 PM EST) w/ little advertising. TNN also stripped ECW of much of its character (e.g. blood, profanity, accidental nudity, etc.) by severely editing and watering down the content.

-Too many bounced checks (this coincided w/ a lot of the big names like Taz, Shane Douglas, Lance Storm, Bam Bam Bigalow, Raven, Sandman, Mikey Whipwreck, and the Dudleys just to name a few jumping ship)

-"The Mass Transit Incident": ECW almost lost a major PPV deal after New Jack's botched blade job on an inexperienced 17-18 year old named Eric Kulas.

-Paul Heyman perhaps starting to feed the mentality to fans that the only way to get a major pop is for blood letting and a series of broken tables rather than efficient ring work.

-Paul Heyman pretty much handling the corporate responsibilities himself and not permitting outside investments.

-Justin Credible's World Title win over Tommy Dreamer (a rehash of Hogan VS Yokozuna at Wrestlemania IX).

More on this discussion can be found at this site:
http://p076.ezboard.com/fwrestlecrap...cID=1333.topic

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http://www.amiannoyingornot.com/(lpg2ut55qv3vmve1lpftsi55)/view.aspx?id=8540&collection=1024

The Resume
(1992-2001)
Defunct
Originally called Eastern Championship Wrestling, but changed the name to Extreme Championship Wrestling (1994)
Extremely aggressive wrestling company
Based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Why they might be annoying
The wrestling was very violent.
It encouraged violence, nudity, profanity and beer drinking.
The fans were blood thirsty and just wanted to see people get the living daylights beaten out of them.
Wrestlers would do promos singling out fans and bashing them.
Fans would yell 'SHOW YOUR TITS' to good-looking girls in the audience.
The company would constantly bash its competition on the air.
Their security guards would be very rude to the fans and would ruin everybody’s good time.
Most of their valets were rude to the fans and would rarely sign autographs.
They had a national TV deal with TNN that turned out to be disastrous, as the station completely watered down the product by eliminating the violence and raunchiness that made it unique from the other wrestling companies.
The poor results of the TV show led to the company filing for bankruptcy, having liabilities of $8,881,435.17 (2001).

Why they might not be annoying
They started out as a small, rinky dink company that turned into a major player, known as 'the little wrestling company that could.'
ECW is easily the greatest Independent wrestling company ever.
They had a wide variety of wrestling, from technical to luchadore to violent hard-core.
Its fans were passionate toward the company and respected all the wrestler's talents.
The fans were so grateful to the talent that whenever a wrestler was wrestling his last match for the company before leaving for another company, the fans would cheer and thank them for all they have done for ECW.
A huge reason for their success was that they were the little guys, different from the biggies, WCW and WWF.
Paul Heyman, the owner and booker of the company, was able to get wrestlers that WWF and WCW couldn’t.
They were the first American wrestling company that could get recognition for wrestlers from Japan and Mexico without latino or asian fans.
Live ECW shows were always a blast and fans raved about the shows, saying that ECW put on the best live events.
Their style was so popular that the WWF and WCW would copy their way of doing things and signed away some of their top wrestlers.


Credit: Reo Rogerz