NWA (ECW) Eastern Championship Wrestling (October 19, 1993)

Original Airdate: October 19, 1993 (taped October 2)

From Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Your Host is Joey Styles

We open with Paul E Dangerously announcing that, now that ECW is part of the NWA, he’s creating a New Dangerous Alliance

Public Enemy v Badd Company: All matches tonight are from night two of Bloodfeast. Johnny Grunge starts with Paul Diamond, and Johnny takes a cheap shot during a ropebreak to take control. Criss cross allows Paul a dropkick and an overhead armdrag, and he sends Grunge to the outside with a jumping backelbow. Inside, tags are made all around, and Rocco Rock dominates Pat Tanaka. Tanaka comes back with a bodyslam (complete with Rock very obviously jumping into it, which looked terribly phony), and tags all around lead to Paul destroying Grunge in the corner. Paul with a corner spinheel kick for two, and Diamond works an armbar from there. DDT gets Paul two, and Pat tags back in, so Grunge begs off. Pat responds with some martial arts moves, so Rock tags back in, and the Enemy manage to trip Diamond up with some double teaming. They cut the ring in half, until Tanaka catches a hot tag, and Roseanne Barr the door! Badd Company isolate Rock for stereo superkicks, and Paul side suplexes him, but Grunge breaks up the cover. Grunge tries a cheap shot, but it backfires on Rock, and Diamond pins Rocco at 14:21. This was really long for what they were bringing to the table. ¾*

Video of Francis Ford Coppola Salvatore Bellomo playing with his children at a park, set to the world’s most depressing piano score

Jimmy Snuka v Chad Austin: Snuka dominates him with a knife-edge chop, as Joey puts over the upcoming November to Remember as the best ECW show ever - and even makes a point of listing out all the other shows that have happened to clarify. Nothing like them telling you the next show will be the best ever, while airing matches from the last one. Jimmy works him over in dull fashion, and a gourdbuster finishes at 2:59. This was just a nothing squash to give Jimmy some heat back after dropping the TV title the night before. DUD

Jay Sulli is in the control center with an update on Dangerously’s intention to restart the Dangerous Alliance, and he presents clips of Styles interviewing Paul and ECW Champion Shane Douglas about it. Sulli trying to do a Gorilla Monsoon impression here is really off putting. Paul also introduces Sherri Martel as part of the group, and he wants to add Sabu to the group, but Shane balks. So, now the Alliance is already in jeopardy of falling apart. Man, even WCW took longer than literally one segment before they started teasing dissention with the nWo. I’ll also note that Sabu looks incredible here, like legitimately frightening. So, that leaves Douglas and Martel at odds with Sabu and Dangerously

Willie Watts is hanging out outside of the Dangerous Alliance’s dressing room, where there’s fussin’ and feudin’ a’goin’ on

Matty in the House is with new manager Jason Knight, who no longer wants to have his last name, he just wants to be known as Jason from here on out. He should go back to the WWF

ECW Tag Team Title Match: Johnny Hot Body and Tony Stetson v Sandman and JT Smith: The heels get control of Sandman early on, but Smith catches a tag… so the champs work him over instead. Hot tag back to Sandman, and he runs wild. Sleeper on Hot Body, but ECW Television Champion Terry Funk attacks Sandman with a chair (angry over Sandman accidentally bumping him while running wild moments before), and that’s a DQ at 4:21. This was barely a match. DUD

We get clips of ECW Champion Shane Douglas defeating JT Smith at Bloodfeast night two, when Funk threw the towel in to save the kid. But then afterwards, Terry beat him down, continuing to tease a heel turn

Tazmaniac v Tommy Dreamer: This is Dreamer’s ECW debut. Tazmaniac tries a sneak attack, but Tommy dodges, and unloads until Tazmaniac bails. Dreamer forces him back in for a jumping backelbow, and he delivers a pair of splashes to the arm ahead of an armbar, as Joey puts him over as a future big star. Powerslam, but Tazmaniac counters with a suplex, and he stomps on Tommy. Tazmaniac hammers away, and a snapmare sets up a chinlock. Dreamer escapes, and hooks a sunset flip for two, but Tazmaniac cuts him off with a clothesline. Back to the chinlock, and a powerslam gets Tazmaniac two. Headbutt finds the mark, and a bodyslam sets up yet another chinlock. Tommy escapes with a bodypress for two, but Tazmaniac counters a DDT with a backdrop. Headbutt drop, but Dreamer dodges, and blasts him with a jumping shoulderblock. Vertical suplex follows, and a one-handed bulldog connects. Elbowdrop, but Tazmaniac dodges, and he dumps Dreamer to the outside. Tazmaniac follows to send Dreamer into one of the support beams, but Tommy whacks him with a chair to get control on the way back in. Dreamer with a leg-feed enzuigiri for two, and a bodyslam sets up a dive, but Dreamer takes too long getting up there, and Tazmaniac crotches him. That allows Tazmaniac a superplex for the win at 6:41. This was the most mainstream match of the episode. This would have been right at home on Wrestling Challenge during that period. ** ¼ 

BUExperience: This was okay. The angles are getting more interesting, and there’s a better solid-to-crap ratio since Paul Heyman took over as booker. They still haven’t discovered the hardcore aspect that made them a big deal yet, though.