Number 10. – The Sandman
In just judging individuals that contributed the most to ECW, it was tied between Tommy Dreamer and The Sandman. Despite Dreamer’s loyalty to ECW, in comparison to The Sandman, Tommy Dreamer is more like a cheer leader routing the hardcore promotion. Sandman on the other hand was an attraction that many wrestling fans want to see. Despite being a hell of an overrated wrestler and he couldn’t have a match without a weapon in hand, Sandman made the most of it with every weapon of choice. The biggest appeal about The Sandman is that he’s the opposite of a good role-model. The dude drinks, smokes, walks through the crowd, smashes beer cans on his forehead, spits his beer, and give the stiffest shots against his opponents. He was the perfect fit to the rebellious and anarchic nature of the product. So many cynical Gen X males could find mass appeal with this abstainer. Plus the whole audience never wanted to see The Sandman to change because singing along with his entrance theme “Enter The Sandman” by Metallica, waving his iconic Singapore cane, and not caring about what happens to his opponent. Luckily, Sandman isn’t an entirely one trick pony where his feuds like Raven, Funk, Dreamer, and many more that pushed him out of the routine and actually take risk and tell stories along with them. For such a mediocre wrestler, whenever Sandman is to tell stories in his feuds, it gets really good. I won’t lie and say watching Sandman wasn’t fun because he definetly was the ultimate party animal. The fact that he won the ECW title five times and no other wrestler exceeded his number of reigns and second longest reign behind Shane Douglas should tell you how accomplished he is as a performer. Though Sandman does get stale with doing the same thing since 1992, an ECW show is incomplete without his iconic entrance and wild brawls.
Number 9. – Jerry Lynn
I can honestly say that Jerry Lynn is the most underrated performer in ECW’s alumni. He’s almost like Terry Funk but could fly and wrestle circles like Super Crazy, Tajiri, and Rob Van Dam. What I admire so much about Jerry Lynn is that the dude was willing to be an all around wrestler. In an environment where violence is expected, Jerry Lynn was able to make the audience happy by having matches without weapons. No matter what stipulation he’s booked in, Lynn was always able to make the most out of his matches. He wasn’t that old but he certainly look like he was much older. That explains why Jerry Lynn was a sympathetic babyface similar to Terry Funk. Not to mention that there were just too much competition and young faces that made it seem that Lynn was struggling in the ring. Jerry Lynn’s greatest accomplishment has to be his feud with Rob Van Dam. The fact that they never had a bad match together and one of them ended up being the match of 1999 (Hardcore Heaven ’99) is nothing to sniff at. Though RVD is a better wrestler (in terms of performance and sheer talent) Lynn was at least the second most talented wrestler in ECW behind “The Whole Fucking Show.” Plus one of the biggest accomplishments that Lynn has that RVD didn’t is that he was an ECW World Heavyweight Champion before Rob was. Lynn was never the most charismatic, charming, or magnetic human being to step inside the squared circle, but damn could the guy give you great in-ring action. In ECW’s twilight, Lynn stepped up and became one of top hands in the promotion’s narrative, and if you were to make a list of the top five in-ring performers in ECW, Lynn would certainly be in that discussion. I could see how Paul Heyman wanted Lynn to be the company’s Shawn Michaels and it’s such as shame that Lynn has been neglected after all of these years. For a sheer workhorse that stuck with ECW till their final day should earn him a spot in the top ten of best ECW wrestlers. It’s so sad that Lynn could never get the push he deserved after ECW closed, but where they were going with Lynn towards the end showed how valued he was to the company.
Number 8. – Shane Douglas
I feel sorry that Shane Douglas ended up getting the short-end of the stick when it comes to being remembered as an ECW champion. The Rise and Fall of ECW Documentary only mentioned his infamous disrespect to the NWA World Heavyweight Championship and not regard him as one of the most important figures of the hardcore promotion. You can tell that WWE still had beef with Douglas since kicking him out in 1995. I mean where do you think Triple H got his gimmick from? Shane Douglas’s charasmatic, intelligent, and athletic heel persona is one of the best effect gimmicks if you wanted a legit heel in a promotion that takes itself seriously. Shane Douglas’s Franchise persona was the original “Cerebral Assassin” & “The Game.” I can’t imagine ECW having a more credible heel than “The Franchise” himself. The man is always after the company’s top spot and chases after the best woman (Francine). Douglas was one selfish motherfucker. Everything he expected out of ECW he believed that it was all meant for him. No matter how many times you may beat him, Douglas finds away to come back and make your life a misrable hell. While a lot of wrestlers in ECW often took bumps to make the crowd roaring, Shane was smart enough to avoid all those unnecessary bumps. He knows that he needs to play safe in order to have a lasting career in ECW. Douglas was always a breath of fresh air from all the over-the-top personalities that flooded the roster. Sure a lot says that his grappling skills are a boring to watch and he really is not good at working with the crowd in his matches because he avoids as much weaponry as possible. However,Douglas could rip apart his foes on the mic, then outwrestle them on the mat. If you look at the history of ECW, you’ll see that many of its finest moments involved Douglas; from the battles with Taz, to the Triple Threat faction’s influence on all of the titles, Douglas was there. Plus having the second most reigns as ECW Champion (4 times) with the longest total amount of 874 days combined made him the longest reigning champion in the promotion’s history. Sometimes Douglas can be his worst enemy considering that he burned so many bridges (even ECW’s) and now he’s in a world where there’s little places for him to go. But that’s a lot of guts to see peronality like Shane Douglas that makes you love to hate him.
Number 7. – The Dudley Boyz
You cannot simply separate D-Von and Buh Buh Ray considering that they are Paul Heyman’s most successful tag team he ever booked. Not since the Road Warriors have I seen another tag team that would go on and win every single tag team title from every promotion they set foot in. However, judging their time in ECW, The Dudleys really made the company’s tag team division an special attraction. This multi-racial tag team is the very definition of diveristy after coming off from the Dudley family faction, who all had (kayfabe) the same legitimate father. Heels in the wrestling industry come and go, but none were as abrasive and caustic as The Dudley Boyz. D-Von and Bubba Ray caused riots when they took the mic, and their in-ring work was always excellent. Not to mention that the Boyz won the ECW Tag Team championship more than any tag team in their roster (a total of 8 reigns) should tell you how goood they really are. Whether they did comedic segements, smack talk the audience, or beat the hell out of whoever is in front of them, The Dudleys created so much heat back in the day. ECW definetly contributed to the amount of heat this very tag team built because so many people actually paid tickets and pay-per-views just to see them get their asses kicked. And like every good heel, whenever D-Von and Buh Buh Ray got down, they comeback with a vengeance. Even though they were ECW’s biggest tag team, The Dudley Boyz eventually became another one of Paul Heyman’s greatest success stories at the D-Von & Ray continued their dominance in the WWE, TNA, and elsewhere. No once was I ever bored watching a Dudley Boyz match because both men knew each other through and through and made the best tag matches when Tag team wrestling at the time was a mixed-bag. These two made tag team have a purpose and they’ve managed to be together since they officially became a tag team in 1996.
Number 6. – Masato Tanaka / Mike Awesome
These two should have been regarded as two of the best feuds in ECW history. Awesome and Tanaka is one of those rare rivalries that never had a bad match together. In fact, these two were made just for each other. Mike Awesome makes a career at powerbombing smaller wrestlers and Tanaka is the one little underdog that had the best endurance the sport has ever seen. Both Tanaka and Awesome had hundreds of good matches together from Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling to Extreme Championship Wrestling and all of them have been stiff and painful looking. How many chairshots, table crashing, and brain truama has both of these competitors endured with each other? It’s impressive to me that thier feud got so big that they both went all the way to the ECW World Heavyweight Championship scene. A feud that has been held in multiple promotions and whenever these two clashed in an ECW show, guaranteed they ended up stealing the show as match of the night. I feel so bad that Mike Awesome got thrown under the bus when he was alive. The man had paychecks skipped and needed to provide for his family. And when he made a return at One Night Stand 2005, Joey Styles shat on him live because he didn’t like him. I bet he regret saying those horrible things to the underrated Mike Awesome considering what saddly happened to him. And for Masato Tanaka, how was he never even mentioned in any documentary involving ECW? I mean ECW is one of the first promotions that put a Japanese wrestler in their world title scene back when the industry neglects any wrestler that wasn’t white. Despite his reign as ECW champion being short, it is proof of how confident ECW was with him as a walking punching bag that’s able to take any sick punishment. In today’s wrestling landscape, their names are certainly not household ones. Many of today’s fans are likely unfamiliar with both of them. I can certainly say that Awesome and Tanaka’s feud is every bit of an attraction for ECW as they were in FMW. I find it very hard pressed to find another international rivalry of epic proportion and these two build each other up into main event status. Out of all the wrestlers in ECW alumni, you won’t find two perfect wrestlers that fit perfectly for the promotion.
Number 5. – Terry Funk
While Funk’s other contemporaries from the Territory days (like Jerry Lawler and Jim Cornette) absolutely hated ECW, Terry Funk is one of those rare old-timers that was willing to adapt to the hardcore style that 1990s wrestling was leaning towards to. Despite being past his prime, Funk refuses to allow that to slow him down. Terry Funk was no longer this old-school wrestler that we knew from the 1970s to the 1980s. He was a legitimate dangerous competitor that is willing to make his matches into a bloody one. Funk brought in a lot of old-school fans into the ECW brand while getting younger fans invested in what he had to offer. Funk often played as the sympathetic babyface that’s impossible to hate. Though none of the ECW matches were as barberic as his FMW death matches (except for his Barbed Wire match with Sabu), Funk still got under people’s skin by making himself look like he was legitimately hurt. That’s why he still worked well as a seller and the audience has nothing but sympathy for a legend that has a lot of heart. Funk just cannot settle down in quitting beause he love wrestling, no matter where it took him. What I find so inspiring about Terry Funk’s time in the 1990s (not just ECW) is that he didn’t allow age to be the limit. Despite risking his health and taking unnecessary bumps that continue to damage his body, it still is impressive that he could still go. Not that many wrestlers that makes it to his age could even still take a beating and still keep up with the young talent who are just starting their careers. That’s a whole lot of sacrifice to start ECW in 1993 when the company began shifting to hardcore wrestling all the way to his supposed 1997 retirement. Let’s not forget that he’s responsible to helping ECW to survive from making the company’s first pay-per-view Barely Legal be a successful show. That in on itself is worthy to be in the top 5. Even though he was supposed to retire in 1997, Funk just couldn’t help himself and still wrestle. Though his ECW return in 1998 felt incredibly weak, nothing will erase all the sacrifices he’s made from 1993 – 1997 for the company. Cheers to Terry Funk for making ECW the company that it is remembered for.
Number 4. – Taz
(Reign on Top – 1995 – 1999)
I hate to say that Taz only worked in Extreme Championship Wrestling because his time outside of ECW, he was lost in the suffle and lost to big matches. We all know know that Taz made a fool out of all of us as this legitamate tough guy. That’s a sign of a good wrestler because he was in kayfabe this whole time (up until RVD told him to pick a hand). But all things considered, Taz was tough. He broke his neck in 1992 and went out for many years. It wasn’t until 1995 he made his return, repackaged from The Tazmaniac to Taz. His persona made him the face of ECW as he beat The Triple Threat faction in nearly every challenge and rose to become ECW World Champion in 1999. Very much like DDP, Taz didn’t hold the company’s most prestigious championship until the late 90s (at Guilty As Charged ’99) which is why he’s not so high up in the list. But before he got there, Taz had the most vicious matches with the ECW roster. He didn’t high-fly like Sabu, RVD, Jerry Lynn, or Lance Storm. He instead grappled his opponents and sent them flying through tables, chairs, ladder, and other objects. Because Taz portrayed himself as this fearless little guy that took no shit from anybody is why he was so feared. His influence has certainly inspired the like of Samoa Joe and other wrestlers that are incapable of high-flying today. His (suposed) final match in ECW was held at Anarchy Rulz ’99 against Mike Awesome and Masato Tanaka. Even though the crowd boo’ed him throughout the match, they gave him a round of applause when he handed the belt to Mike Awesome. It’s too bad that his WWF run sucked to high water because after he defeated Kurt Angle’s undefeated streak, he couldn’t go any further. Even thought Extreme Championship Wrestling is looked as a promotion where midcarder had a chance to be main eventers, Taz was that nobody that turned into a household name in professional wrestling. All of his efforts in the 1990s has made many of ECW’s events a memorable one.
Number 3. – Raven
One of Extreme Championship Wrestling’s greatest creations was to reinvent Scott Levy’s goofy characters (like Johnny Polo) and turned him into a wrestler inspired by Edgar Allan Poe. Mysterious. Enigmatic. Perverse. There’s a laundry list of words that can be used to describe Raven. As the promotion’s number 1 heel, Raven loves to go above and beyond your typical heel. Unlike Shane Douglas that seeks to beat his opponents to humiliation, Raven on the other hand wants to scar you personal and hurt you where it hurts the most. Just look at how Sandman took it when Raven made his own son hate him, or bringing Tommy Dreamer’s school crush into ECW and makes her his valet, or using his Raven’s Nest faction to invoke fear to the crowd. While Raven lacked in a lot of ring skills, he certainly makes up for it by being one of the darkest characters. Not since Jake “The Snake” Roberts has Raven made himself such a presence in the world of wrestling. This grungy punk that love to quote Allan Poe and come up with all sore of creative ways to make his storylines interesting is why Raven is an invaluable piece to the puzzle. While the audience craved for the best in-ring work, violence, and sexuality, Raven gave everyone what they didn’t know that they needed; a well-told story. That’s why the fans couldn’t hate Raven as much as Paul Heyman wanted them to because they respect the creativity and effort Raven puts in his promos, rivalries, segments and the directions he took his opponents. Plus let’s not forget that in his reign as ECW World Champion he defeated the undefeated Dr. Death Steve Williams, single handedly. It’s no wonder why WCW saw a lot of potential in Raven that WWE refused to acknowledge. But Scott Levy knew that good wrestling is not good enough. He wanted to make his moments to be memorable and get people interested in watching, star ratings be damned. Though his return in 1999 wasn’t as good as his run from 1995 – 1997 but he’s always been the most invaluable member in ECW’s roster. Because Raven dared to take wrestling into places that no one would dare to go (like Crucifying The Sandman), he’s been nearly every wrestling fan’s favorite storyteller. Raven defintely knows that wrestling each other have no purpose without a story behind it and since then ECW became more than just a hardcore promotion but a dark narrative that so happens to be set in the wrestling wring.
Number 2. – Rob Van Dam
It’s very interesting that Rob Van Dam never won the ECW World Heavyweight Championship during ECW’s time in the company. I say that because he was the face of the hardcore promotion all the way through the company’s final days. Rob Van Dam was still an accomplished wrestler even without winning ECW’s most prestigious championship, but making his ECW television championship reign worth a damn and also making match of the year. The amount of talent RVD has is truly impecable. The dude can litterally roll on the mat one second and then fly over the guard rail the next. He can jump over your head one second, and kick the chair to your face the next. Rob Van Dam is almost like the less sloppier version of Sabu mixed with martial arts-style wrestling. RVD was more than a guy that looked like Jean-Claude Van Damme, he wrestled jus as well as his mic skill. I think RVD is incredibly underrated when it comes to his impecable charisma. The dude didn’t waste your time with another wrestler screaming on the mic on how much he wants to beat his opponent in an up coming match. Instead Rob just kept talking about how chill he is and why you should watch his match. RVD was a breath of fresh air from all of the intense wrestlers who’s trying too hard. RVD just makes himself more than well known and makes you satisfied that you stay tuned to see him in action. The fact that he had match of the year with Jerry Lynn from Hardcore Heaven ’99 is truly astonishing. Though RVD became a bigger draw in his time in WWE, his time in ECW made an impact and is one of the key components to the company’s legacy.
Number 1. – Sabu
A Middle Eastern wrestler that managed to create an attraction for the promotion instead being booked as your stereotypical foreign heel is one of the most inclusive aspects that ECW has done. Even through the ultra violence and misogyny doesn’t sit well with many wrestling fans today, but I can easily say that ECW gave non-White wrestlers a fair chance. Sabu is one of those non-white wrestlers that made it bigger than he had ever right to be. When we’re talking about an ECW alumni that debut in 1993 and made moment after moment with the company. Though far from being the most disciplined wrestlers, Sabu is definetly one of wrestlings biggest daredevils. It’s sad that everyone remembers the guy for making botched moves, but no wrestler can ever perfectly time their gravitational pull when they dive in the air nor will they be certain if the landing will hit perfectly. For someone like Sabu to do that perfectly on a nightly basis, you have youself one of the best risk takers that the industry has ever seen. The fact that guy cares little of his physical well-being is why Sabu should be honored as one of the best of ECW’s alumni. With every one of his matches, Sabu took chances time and time again. The fact that he took said chances speak volumes of his capability in the ring and outside of it too. In fact, Saub is the very reason why the term Extreme is synonymous with ECW. I cannot imagine ECW being the company that it is without Sabu. Back in 1993 – 2000, Sabu managed to be more fearsome than even his uncle The Shiek. Sabu just knew how to give the audience what they want and almost all of his matches, he over-performed. Along with Taz, Sabu is a ECW’s few triple crown winner accomplishing the ECW World Tag Team Championship (twice), ECW Television Championship, and the ECW WOrld Tag Team Champion (three times). Not to mention he is one of the two wrestlers that won Taz’s Fuck The World Championship which is telling how much of an accomplished wrestler he truly is in just a singular promotion. For a wrestle that spoke very little in his time in ECW, he could sway the audience into loving him or hating him without ever spilling a sentence. Plus many of ECW’s greatest matches involved Sabu and because he was the biggest contributing factor for the promotion is why he deserved to be the best of the ECW alumni. There is simply no way you can have a hardcore promotion without a risk taker like Sabu.
The Top Lister 