Tuesday Night Turmoil: Fantastic

ECW is the A show. There, I said it. I meant it, and I'm sticking to it. Edge may be the man in WWE right now, but there are other parts of that show that aren't that great. ECW may have lackluster performances but overall it is the best product put out by WWE on a consistent basis.

They are young, talented, and while internally it may be considered a televised "developmental territory" on the outside it looks like a legitimate factor. The television ratings may not be stellar, but keep in mind that it is slotted at ten p.m. on a network reserved for meatballs.

If this show is a developmental territory the future looks bright. With Evan Bourne starting from the bottom and making his way to the top, inarguably one of the most over guys, not on that roster, but in wrestling (glad Matt Striker agrees), Matt Hardy poised to take the top spot on the brand, and an announce team that in it's second week is better than anything Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler, Michael Cole and Jonathon Coachman has ever done. Matt Striker is pure gold as a color commentator, and Todd Grisham is so much better than I ever expected, and I gladly admit that I was wrong in my original opinion.

Did ECW have negatives? Sure it did, but those negatives are still slightly better or on par with the other show's "positives." It's kind of like SEC football, the mid-range to lower tier teams are still better than most others. Wouldn't you rather watch Finlay and Estrada instead of Snitsky and Hardcore Holly? Finlay is one of those guys who could make a Flatliner look like a million bucks, and that's saying something. I'm also interested to see where this angle with Mike Knox ends up.

Even Colin Delaney and Tommy Dreamer put on a good extreme rules match this week. Matt Striker by the way mentioned something interesting. The last two guys to compete in an extreme rules match on ECW are now the United States and Intercontinental Champions. The match told a good story and had it's fair share of O-tastic spots. Speaking of O's, how about Rick Ortiz' O rally towel? That was interesting. On the topic of Ricky Ortiz, after Braden Walker got his walking papers the "New Talent Initiative" continues and Ortiz will get a new superstar opponent next week. It's about time Colt Cabana got the call up isn't it? Rhetorical question O-sters.

I'm going to revert back to Matt Hardy before I get into the main event of ECW this week. The ECW Championship match with Mark Henry and Matt Hardy feels like more of a main event than Triple H and Khali, because frankly nobody cares about a match that features Khali. This match is only happening because Triple H wants to bury another giant, and this Sunday at SummerSlam he gets his shot and nobody will care. Adversely almost everyone cares about Matt Hardy.

All the Matt Hardy haters, however few of them there really are chose the same things to try and "expose." "Matt Hardy is weak on the mic," "Matt Hardy is slow," "Matt Hardy walks funny," whatever the case may be you're just trying to hate and get yourself noticed. Matt Hardy gets a reaction week in and week out and it's top three loudest in the arena's wherever they happen to be. He'd get the same reaction in MSG as he would in Schenectady. Go to a WWE show and look at the merch and the signs. Maybe one or two guys with more than Hardy, but not many.

Depending on which group has their way, Johnny Ace, Triple H and the 3% of the fans that hate Hardy, or the rest of the general public Matt Hardy will carry the WWE or World Heavyweight Championship before it's over. By the way, Triple H should go look at financial statistics and merchandise numbers and rethink that "He never made the company any money anyway" comment from a few years ago. Pretty big step-out at the time anyway, and now a proven mistake.

While on the topic of Matt Hardy I'll go ahead and get to the ECW main event which featured Matt Hardy and Mark Henry against MnM. I will say this, the Miz has officially become a star. He has nicely come into his own and, while maybe not a good worker, can get it done in so many other ways. While a good bit of this can be credited to John Morrison, it is still true. His promo skills may not be for everyone, but they make you form an opinion. You love him or you hate him, and that makes a great overall character, and in Miz' case a very good heel.

John Morrison has the "it" quality, not shit as Dante Ross described, but the "it" that is so hard for so many to describe but incredibly easy to point out. He'll be a non-motorcycle riding Randy Orton type heel before too long. He can work, he can talk (though again while not everyone's cup of tea) and he's over as well. John Morrison and the Miz as a tag team is great and it still has legs, and hopefully when they do part ways it will involve a singles championship that will make them and the championship both look good.

The tag team match itself was fine. I had no problems with where it went, though if it had been for the WWE Tag Team Championships I'd have been immediately irked, and while I'd rather see MnM have these belts, tonight I was glad they didn't. Both teams, and I use that term loosely looked good and the final result wasn't going to be relevant anyway, because the aftermath of the match would be the payoff for the show anyway. I don't like calling matches irrelevant, though largely they can be.

The finish to that match was an odd one that actually did help build to the penultimate moment of the night and that was a "World's Strongest Slam" on Matt Hardy. Now going with normal WWE logic or Egic, Matt Hardy should go over and become ECW Champion at SummerSlam but I just don't see it happening. Matt Hardy is the king of the old school title chase. If he does win at SummerSlam it won't bother anyone, but I wouldn't mind seeing this storyline go on far into the future.

DJB's What to Watch:
The entire show

Quick Results...
*Tommy Dreamer def. Colin Delaney in an Extreme Rules Match
*Evan Bourne def. Bam Neely
*Finlay def. Armando Estrada
*Matt Hardy & Mark Henry def. MnM

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