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Post by bmfjules on Oct 14, 2018 17:31:11 GMT -5
I am talking in the immediate 2001/02 aftermath - as a big fan of the little promotion that couldn't, I always wondered what could have been if select parts of the OVW early 2000s class such as Brock, Orton, Shelton etc had ventured to South Philly as a continuation of the WWE/ECW talent exchange deal, or if some of the guys who would go on to dominate the early to mid 2000 indies got a chance such as Punk, Joe, Bryan etc...plus obviously there's all the WCW talent like Mike Awesome, Shane Douglas, and Lance Storm who were big players in ECW before, and ex ECW WWE guys who were basically just there to fill time on Sunday Night Heat like Raven, post-RTC Stevie Richards, and Tazz. And that's just the ECW alumni - too many to list in terms of guys who just fell off the radar after WCW folded except for maybe a brief run in developmental.
(For the purposes of discussion, this "survival" assumes some money mark decided to bail out Paul E. and they secured a decent TV deal at least equal to the one they had on TNN.)
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chazraps
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Post by chazraps on Oct 14, 2018 17:41:37 GMT -5
For the record, before the discussion begins, Heyman has gone on record (so take this with a dumptruck full of salt) that he was looking into debuting Low-Ki and was in negotiations to bring in Kobashi at the time.
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Post by bmfjules on Oct 14, 2018 17:52:34 GMT -5
Low Ki I can see him building into something special and he fits in perfectly with the guys they had at the time like Tajiri, Super Crazy, Guido etc as far as workrate and gimmick.
I wonder what he was planning for Kobashi though? I don't see any obvious opponents for him at the time that work as well as Kobashi vs. Joe did in ROH a few years later - assuming he wasn't eyeing Joe at the time as well.
RVD vs Kobashi is the only match I can think of that sort of makes sense, but who goes over?
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CMWaters
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Post by CMWaters on Oct 14, 2018 18:00:57 GMT -5
Abyss, while possibly under a different name, would be right at home.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 14, 2018 18:02:15 GMT -5
I can’t imagine Kobashi coming over for anything more than one or two matches, with RVD being the only real opponent for him.
I definitely can imagine Paul doing something with Low Ki. Honestly he probably would have snatched up a lot of the early ROH guys, Ki, AJ, Danielson, Joe, etc.
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Post by TOK Hehe'd Around & Found Out on Oct 14, 2018 18:16:56 GMT -5
Paul has been on-record since 02 that he was already looking to make ECW more in-ring focused, and I have to assume that we'd get the AJPW/NOAH influence that ROH got as Gabe got more influence.
Think 05 ROH but more fun
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Post by bmfjules on Oct 14, 2018 18:24:18 GMT -5
I can’t imagine Kobashi coming over for anything more than one or two matches, with RVD being the only real opponent for him. I definitely can imagine Paul doing something with Low Ki. Honestly he probably would have snatched up a lot of the early ROH guys, Ki, AJ, Danielson, Joe, etc. Right, in a way it would have been a reboot of the Benoit, Malenko, Guerrero, Jericho era. (I know Jericho was later.) Abyss would have made a great monster for James Mitchell as he wound up being later on anyway, but he would have had an extra dose of realism and been less hokey. My main fantasy booking for years has been Triple Threat version 3.0 with a returning Shane Douglas flanked by rookie upstarts Brock Lesnar and Shelton Benjamin. Both eventually turn on the Franchise in kinda the same way Evolution eventually broke up in WWE. Also going back to the OVW class from what we saw out of Randy Orton's matches with Mick Foley and other sadistic moments through the years he could have been a mega player in ECW, kind of a mixture of Shane Douglas and Raven.
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Post by TOK Hehe'd Around & Found Out on Oct 14, 2018 18:42:21 GMT -5
The real interesting question is the butterfly effect this would have over the entire industry. ECW going under opened up the underground wrestling marketplace massively, as anyone who helped Heyman opened up their own promotions who all majorly shaped the entire industry for the next two decades. ROH is the most obvious, but literally everything would be different. XPW would have been dead in the water, and we wouldn't have had the subsequent rise of the So-Cal scene that came out of that whole debacle. IWA-MS wouldn't have been able to have the profile that it got, so everyone associated with it wouldn't have been able to show their stuff (Punk, Hero, Cabana, Anderson).
The biggest change would be that the creative freedom and room to innovate that guys had while being independent wouldn't have flown under ECW-exclusive contracts. The entire genre changed because talent got to do whatever the hell they wanted and work with anyone they could. Heyman was great at utilizing talent, but he never really developed guys into anything except what would benefit ECW.
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hassanchop
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Post by hassanchop on Oct 14, 2018 19:05:27 GMT -5
I can see Shane Douglas burying WCW after it closes down and rant on how they are now WWE's headache. Speaking of which, I wonder if WWE still does the Invasion angle without both the major players and ECW, and as it does poorly, and had ECW got that TV deal with USA or some other network by luck, I can see them taking jabs at the piss poor way they are handling the WCW Invasion, and maybe if Lance Storm and Mike Awesome return they'd bury the shit out of both WWF and WCW, they would shoot at the top WCW names sitting at home getting paid(which will probably play a major factor on fans' perception of the Invasion) and the horrible WWE locker room attitude and bullying, which Mike Awesome mentioned after he was released. And I'm pretty sure they will do a parody Invasion.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 14, 2018 20:47:27 GMT -5
Just imagine Kobashi vs The Sandman, lol.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 14, 2018 21:12:44 GMT -5
Messiah
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CMWaters
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Post by CMWaters on Oct 14, 2018 21:28:55 GMT -5
Honestly, thinking about it...and this may be a weird one but...
Ron Killings.
Probably playing something like his more edgy (not severely so) character when he won the NWA title.
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Post by bmfjules on Oct 14, 2018 21:34:03 GMT -5
I can see Shane Douglas burying WCW after it closes down and rant on how they are now WWE's headache. Speaking of which, I wonder if WWE still does the Invasion angle without both the major players and ECW, and as it does poorly, and had ECW got that TV deal with USA or some other network by luck, I can see them taking jabs at the piss poor way they are handling the WCW Invasion, and maybe if Lance Storm and Mike Awesome return they'd bury the shit out of both WWF and WCW, they would shoot at the top WCW names sitting at home getting paid(which will probably play a major factor on fans' perception of the Invasion) and the horrible WWE locker room attitude and bullying, which Mike Awesome mentioned after he was released. And I'm pretty sure they will do a parody Invasion. Every week a different WCW jobber comes out and says we're taking over only to get New Jacked.
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Post by OVO 40 hunched over like he 80 on Oct 14, 2018 22:41:03 GMT -5
Like someone mentioned above, it would’ve been essentially early ROH but with better production and storylines.
Heyman wouldve still been a scum and a thief and Tommy Dreamer wouldn’t have been paid in four more years. Even though Heyman is morally bankrupt, he was a genius in storytelling and producing shows. Early ROH looked like shit from a production standpoint, Heyman would’ve fixed that.
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hassanchop
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Post by hassanchop on Oct 14, 2018 23:03:51 GMT -5
But I’m kinda curious hypothetically if ECW was still around how would it affect the Invasion angle with just WCW?
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El Pollo Guerrera
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Oct 15, 2018 1:04:01 GMT -5
The real interesting question is the butterfly effect this would have over the entire industry. ECW going under opened up the underground wrestling marketplace massively, as anyone who helped Heyman opened up their own promotions who all majorly shaped the entire industry for the next two decades. ROH is the most obvious, but literally everything would be different. XPW would have been dead in the water, and we wouldn't have had the subsequent rise of the So-Cal scene that came out of that whole debacle. IWA-MS wouldn't have been able to have the profile that it got, so everyone associated with it wouldn't have been able to show their stuff (Punk, Hero, Cabana, Anderson). The biggest change would be that the creative freedom and room to innovate that guys had while being independent wouldn't have flown under ECW-exclusive contracts. The entire genre changed because talent got to do whatever the hell they wanted and work with anyone they could. Heyman was great at utilizing talent, but he never really developed guys into anything except what would benefit ECW. Another Heyman thought... if ECW doesn't close, Pauly's not in the WWE system to become Lesnar's manager, or to become the SmackDown GM/writer. If I recall correctly, the time that SmackDown was beating RAW in the ratings was about the time Pauly was running that show. Would ECW become a second developmental territory for the WWE, along with OVW? Or does ECW sign a deal with TNA to combine forces against the WWE?
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Cvslfc123
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Post by Cvslfc123 on Oct 15, 2018 5:26:55 GMT -5
But I’m kinda curious hypothetically if ECW was still around how would it affect the Invasion angle with just WCW? They probably would have gone ahead with the weekly WCW show. We also would have never seen the amazing JR and Paul Heyman commentary team.
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hassanchop
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Post by hassanchop on Oct 15, 2018 7:48:17 GMT -5
But I’m kinda curious hypothetically if ECW was still around how would it affect the Invasion angle with just WCW? They probably would have gone ahead with the weekly WCW show. We also would have never seen the amazing JR and Paul Heyman commentary team. I get a feeling they will merge WCW with HWA and OVW talent. If we won't have Heyman, then we'd have the team of JR and Scott Hudson, and maybe Bobby Heenan. I could imagine ECW taking jabs at the WCW Invasion by shooting that the reason we don't see the big names is because of their contracts. And like someone mentioned above about a mock WCW invasion in ECW, I get a feeling they will have some of them act like the big names ala Billionaire Ted skits, with a parody of Eric Bischoff and maybe Gillberg comes out only to get attacked by the Gangstas each week, or maybe they will hire Kevin Sullivan and reform the Dungeon of Doom only goofier and they all get fed kendo sticks and chairshots each week they try to take over.
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Post by BRAINFADE on Oct 15, 2018 9:40:20 GMT -5
I always thought that Billy Kidman would have been a good fit in a more in-ring orientated ECW. He could have have great matches with Super Crazy, Tajiri, Jerry Lynn and others.
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Post by Crow Dust on Oct 15, 2018 11:53:53 GMT -5
Every time Paul has talked about Kobashi he has said it was for him vs Misawa in the US.
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