Kevin McElvaney’s Take On ECW – 1/15/2008 Edition



Hey there, WrestleZone readers. Here’s my weekly take on ECW on Sci-Fi…the January 15th edition.

ECW opened up with “The Cutting Edge” segment. Edge’s guest was ECW champ, CM Punk. Kevin Nash told Samoa Joe that he reminded him a lot of himself when he was younger. Whoops, I mean Edge told Punk. Why do I feel like both are correct and recent?

It was pretty cool to see some tension between brand champions. A few things didn’t make sense here, though. For one, Edge was arguing on behalf of Chavo Guerrero. On Smackdown, they’re at odds with one another. Nonetheless, they double teamed Punk and left him laying.

Morrison and Miz reigned as the top tandem for yet another week, defeating Raw’s The Highlanders. It wasn’t as good as M&M’s matches with Yang & Moore, but that angle has pretty much its course. Good segment for showcasing the tag champs against a different team. It was nice to see The Highlanders used, as well.

Kofi Kingston is coming next week to ECW. Let’s hope he brings with him the soothing reggae music used in his vignettes.

Kelly Kelly came out and cut the worst promo this side of Vickie Guerrero. ECW is in HD next week.

Tazz was in the ring with Colin “Mikey Whipwreck” Delaney. He was even more bandaged up than he was last week. His opponent? The Big Red Machine, Kane.

QUOTE OF THE NIGHT:



“This is gonna be like Sasquatch smashing a smurf!”



–Joey Styles

Kane won easily, with a chokeslam. A lot of head and neck trauma in this one, so I’m calling it now – next week, Delaney’s in a hi-def-friendly medical halo.

Raw Recap. Why do they do these on ECW? Does anyone really watch ECW and not Raw? Even if so, why does the Recap need to be so lengthy?

Nonetheless, it was great seeing that Swanton Bomb again, and the video package was worth viewing if only to hear Randy Orton’s Muppetous voice echo dramatically.

Shelton Benjamin defeated Nunzio with an inverted bulldog. A little slower and less physical than Shelton’s been. After the match, Shelton interrupted his theme song (YET AGAIN) to shout the BEGINNING of his theme song. Yes, figure that one out, folks.

Actually, maybe this is genius. Maybe this is just another way WWE has found to get under my marky skin.

RUNNER-UP QUOTE OF THE NIGHT:



“I’m just saying a man who’s 5’6″ shouldn’t wear a size 14 boot.”



–Joey Styles to Tazz, after a brief discourse on Nunzio’s surprisingly large feet.

Main event time. And, as predicted, they found a way to weasel Chavo into the main event picture, despite him not winning a single clean match on ECW.

Edge, who was at ringside doing color commentary, attacked Punk with the World Heavyweight Title belt, laying him out on the outside. The official counted to 10, declaring Chavo the winner and new number one contender.

The only good that can possibly come of this is a Punk-Edge feud. Otherwise, they’ve just made Punk look really, really weak.

Time to rate this week’s show! The opening and closing segments, despite seeming interesting on paper, just confused and disappointed me. If they’re pushing Chavo, why couldn’t he have just won a number one contender’s match or *GASP* been GIVEN a title shot at the pay-per-view. Furthermore, why are Chavo and Edge, who have been in disagreement over Vickie’s actions on Smackdown, buddy buddy all of a sudden?

With that said, I really like the Colin Delaney angle, and it’s nice to see Shelton’s push continue on. No Big Daddy V or Mark Henry this week, which was surprising. That said, Undertaker totally buried them on last week’s Smackdown, so that may be for the best.

After tonight’s show, and with the Royal Rumble less than two weeks away, I’m very interested to tune in next week.

The 1/15/08 ECW gets a 7/10.

TRENDING


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