WWE "ECW on Syfy"
Taped earlier tonight in Memphis, Tenn.

[Q1] The opening video aired. Josh Matthews and Bryon Saxton welcomed us to the show. Josh said Vince McMahon would appear on the show tonight to reveal the future of ECW...

Savannah introduced Tony Atlas, who introduced The Abraham Washington Show. Abe said he has not been around because NBC wanted him to replace Conan O'Brien. Abe asked rhetorically why he did not take the job. Atlas said, "Because you aren't that good." Funny line.

Abe said he was entertaining and loyal. He said he stayed for the fans and the fans owed him forty million dollars. "What more could you want from me?" Atlas answered, "How about you actually try to be funny?" Abe mocked Tony's laugh and introduced the ECW Champion, Christian...

Twill's Two Cents: Tony is batting 1.000 tonight. Great stuff so far from the Hall of Famer.

Abe told Christian he has held his championship longer than any male or female champion in WWE right now. Christian started to comment when Zack Ryder's music hit. Ryder and Rosa Mendes came out. Ryder showed Hurricane Helms' mugshot on the Titantron. He said Helms got in a fight "like those posers from Jersey Shore." Funny.

Christian said Ryder was just upset that Helms made it on TMZ and Ryder never had. Ryder said he was in the Rumble. Christian said he blinked and missed it. Christian said Helms made a mistake and people make mistakes. He said Tiffany made a mistake giving Abe his own talk show, he made one agreeing to be on the show, and Ryder made a mistake hooking up with Rosa. Ryder pushed Christian, and Abe abruptly ended the show...

Twill's Two Cents: It must be jacket weather in hell because not only was that the best AWS ever (which would be easy to do by default), that was a funny and strong segment. There were some good one liners, they advanced a program, and Abe is at his best when he is slightly self deprecating.

Matthews and Saxton acknowledged Vince McMahon appearing on the show tonight... [C]

[Q2] The announcers briefly mentioned the Royal Rumble and a shot of Memphis was shown. Shelton Benjamin made his entrance and footage was shown of Vance Archer attacking Shelton last week...

1. Vance Archer defeated Shelton Benjamin in 9:46. Immediately, Shelton hit a suicide dive over the top rope and onto Archer. Back in the ring, he hit a back suplex and again knocked Vance to the floor. He ran the apron and jumped at Archer, but Vance moved and Shelton hit the barricade very hard... [C]

Back from commercial, Vance was still in control. For the second time, Matthews referred to Vance as "icy." Who is feeding him that crap? Icy? He's not a dangerous road. Anyway, Vance scored a two count after a vertical suplex. He followed with a side suplex for another nearfall.

Archer worked on the arm and shoulder. Shelton fought back and hit what could best be described as a single leg DDT (picture the beginning of a single leg Boston Crab into a DDT on the leg). He countered a suplex into a reverse neckbreaker. The match abruptly ended when Archer pinned Shelton with his legs on the ropes...

Twill's Two Cents: It's always been a pet peeve, but it should not be any more difficult to kick out of a cover when someone has their feet on the ropes. Good match between these two and the finish suggests we will see more of the feud, which is just fine with me. These two work well together.

Footage aired of last night's very good segment involving Bret Hart and Vince McMahon. They added some very good music and even threw in a short amount of Stu Hart footage.

[Q3] The video package ended with Bret spitting on Vince in 1997, and Vince spitting on Bret last night. Matthews said they would show exclusive footage of what happened between Batista and John Cena after Raw went off the air last night on Friday's Smackdown...

Twill's Two Cents: Great video package and I think they should utilize their dark match footage more often, especially if something noteworthy happens. Solid segment.

Christian vs. Zack Ryder was announced as the main event of the show because of what happened earlier in the show... [C]

Twill's Two Cents: Hmmm, storyline wise, did they not have a main event in place until just now? What does Tiffany do all day anyway?

Did you know? WWE.com had over four billion website hits, which beat several other popular webpages...

Yoshi Tatsu and Goldust made their entrance. Yoshi will face Trent Baretta in a one-on-one match...

2. Yoshi Tatsu (with Goldust) defeated Trent Baretta (with Caylen Croft) in 3:56. Yoshi hit a nice dropkick and followed with his finishing kick, but Trent ducked out of the way. Saxton said he "scouted it." Actually, no, he just reacted. Much different there Byron. Trent slowed things down and worked on the head and neck.

Yoshi hit a series of kicks and followed with another one after a roll through. He went to the top and Baretta ran the ropes similar to how Kurt Angle does it, and hit a huracarana. Impressive. When he did not get the three count, he argued with the referee. He then ate a kick and lost...

Twill's Two Cents: Honestly, that was difficult to get into, but Baretta was good here and Croft's reactions on the floor were solid. Yoshi is a fun midcard guy, but that is about it. By the way, are Josh and Byron getting fired and did they get word of it? It's like they are calling a funeral tonight.

Footage was shown promoting the Rumble replay... [C]

[Q4] Straight from the "We make too many DVDs because you will keep buying them" file, the Best of Raw 2009 is now available on DVD...

Savannah introduced Vince McMahon, who came out wearing a pink and black tie. He stopped at the stage. He immediately said that ECW would be going off the air in three weeks. He thanked everybody for the success of ECW. He said a new show would air at the exact same time and would be the next evolution in WWE programming. He thanked everyone...

Twill's Two Cents: That worked for me. Short and sweet. I'm guessing we'll get something "different" for a week or two, followed by another show just like ECW that is not called ECW.

Gregory Helms stood in the middle of the ring and introduced Ezekiel Jackson, who came out with William Regal. He asked Zeke how he would get past not winning the ECW Championship. Regal interrupted and said Helms had a tough week and it was about to get worse.

Zeke and Regal attacked Helms. Zeke hit his finisher and Regal hit the running knee. Christian came down with a kendo stick to run off Zeke and Regal. He checked on Helms... [C]

Twill's Two Cents: Helms got his on-air punishment (for the second time tonight) and Zeke got his heat back. WWE killed two birds with one stone. Solid.

3. Christian defeated Zack Ryder (with Rosa Mendes) by disqualification in a non-title match in 5:28. Christian and Ryder traded offensive moves early. They wrestled with Ryder on the apron and Christian hit the running, delayed dropkick. Christian could not hit a missile dropkick and Ryder countered with a slingshot into the bottom rope.

[Overrun] Ryder hit the leg lariat and scored a nearfall. Christian scored his first nearfall with a high cross body from the top rope. He went back to the top and earned another nearfall with a missile dropkick. He hit a springboard sunset flip, but Ryder leaned forward ala Davey Boy Smith against Bret Hart and scored a very nearfall. He hit the Killswitch but Zeke hit the ring and the referee called for the the bell...

Jackson and Regal left Christian laid out on the floor after throwing him into the ring steps. They stood triumphantly over him as the show went off the air...

Twill's Two Cents: Honestly, I was hoping for a Ryder victory to propel him into the title picture, but I am cool with Jackson reestablishing his positioning for another shot as well. Jackson and Regal had a good night. The entire show was one of the strongest ECW shows to date.

What did you think of the show? Feel free to let me know by shooting an email to dotnetrich@gmail.com.

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