Written by: Bob Colling
Extreme Championship Wrestling presents Hardcore TV
Date: 12/18/1998
From: Tokyo, Japan & Ft. Lauderdale, FL
Matches:
1.) ECW World Champion Shane Douglas defeated Gedo to retain the title
2.) Jerry Lynn defeated Mikey Whipwreck
3.) Rob Van Dam & Sabu defeated ECW World Tag Team Champions Dudley Boys to win the titles
Angle Developments:
1.) Douglas is the only American World Champion to defend his championship in Japan. Gedo and Douglas traded rollups in the opening moments of the contest. The match is clipped as Gedo dropkicks the left knee of Douglas to get control of the bout. Gedo locks in the figure four in the middle of the ring but isn’t able to get a submission. Douglas is able to reverse the hold but Gedo reaches the ropes quickly. Douglas hits an inverted rolling neck snap. Francine helps Douglas get some extra leverage on an abdominal stretch. Gedo drives Douglas down to the mat by his leg and nearly wins following a top rope frog splash. Douglas plants Gedo with a fisherman buster and wins the match.
2.) Whipwreck works over Lynn in the corner with several strikes but Lynn gets control with more strikes. Lynn misses a splash in the corner and crashes to the canvas. Lance Storm makes his way out rather quickly into the match with Tammy Lynn Bych. Lynn takes Whipwreck down with a gut buster as the match is going to be clipped as well it looks like. Lynn sends Mikey over the railing and into the crowd. Lynn drops Whipwreck throat first across the guard railing. Storm trips Lynn from the floor and Mikey knocks Jerry through the middle rope to the floor. Lynn hammers away on Storm on the floor and sends Lance into the railing. Whipwreck hits a side Russian leg sweep to ram Lynn against the railing. Lynn hits a head scissors takedown back in the ring and a spinning back elbow. Mikey avoids a middle rope missile dropkick but Lynn hits an inverted DDT. Lynn goes to the top but is shoved off by Storm.
Mikey hits the Whippersnapper but Lynn gets his boot on the bottom rope. Storm whacks Lynn over the back with a chair from the floor and Mikey gets a near fall. Lynn kicks out on a rollup and Storm hits Whipwreck with a chair. Lynn hits a German suplex and gets the win. I can’t rate this since it was clipped, but it did no favors to Whipwreck at all. After the match, Lynn misses a cross body and hits the stage instead of Storm. Storm sends Lynn hard into the stage. Storm is pissed and says they can’t beat him because he is from Canada.
3.) The main event looks like it is going to be clipped, which is a bummer. Bubba tosses a table into the ring and Sabu hits Bubba with it. Bubba picks it up to drop Sabu. Bubba hits the Bubba Bomb and puts a head scissors on Sabu. Sabu works over Bubba with basic strikes and hits a springboard hurricanrana. RVD gets the tag and hammers away on D-Von with kicks to the midsection. Van Dam takes D-Von over with a hurricanrana but is stopped by an elbow. D-Von hits a neck breaker off the middle rope but Sabu makes the save. RVD somersaults over the top to take the Dudley’s out. Sabu hit a triple jump moonsault on D-Von. Bubba plants Sabu with a power bomb. RVD leaps off the top to dive into the crowd to hit a cross body. Sabu hits Bubba with a table, but Bubba no sells it and nails Sabu right in the face with it. Van Dam comes back in and kicks the table into Bubba.
Van Dam hits rolling thunder and Sabu hits a slingshot leg drop. D-Von is held on a table and Sabu hits a slingshot leg drop from the ring to put D-Von through the table. D-Von power bombs RVD while Bubba hit a superplex on Sabu. Van Dam hits the frog splash on Bubba but can’t get a three count. Dudley’s hit a double team neck breaker on RVD and Bubba hit an overhead suplex on Van Dam. Van Dam kicks a chair into Bubba’s face and gets the pin along with Sabu. Of course, the match is heavily clipped, but it was a fun watch for what they showed.
Final Thoughts:
I”m not sure what the point of the title change was here, but whatever. Whipwreck is not anywhere near the level of Lynn and Storm and it doesn’t surprise me that he would soon jump to WCW to at least get a decent payday when he could. Quite honestly, there wasn’t much going on here and it seemed like they just wanted to show clips from a Japan show.
Thanks for reading.