As it seems the extreme era of ECW is now in the past as it is clearly the brand to bring in new talent, it was only fitting that the old championship belt should be retired. So tonight Teddy Long presented Mark Henry with the new belt in the birth place of ECW. To bad the belt looked like one of the cheap ones you can buy at the local toy store. This is only fitting as ECW is but a shell of what it once was and now is only cheap knock off brand for the WWE.
This presentation ceremony led to our fist match of the night as Teddy long called for a match between Tommy Dreamier and Colin Delaney. Delaney was in the ring celebrating his turn on Dreamer with Tony Atlas and Mark Henry, but those two left him to the wills of Dreamer as the match began. For once dreamer was the one dishing out the butt kicking as he mopped the ring with Delaney.
The main event was fatal four way to determine the opponent for Henry at Summer Slam. And to no surprise it was the former US champ Matt Hardy who won. You have to see him becoming champ at Summer Slam now the US belt is off him. That will be his chance to establish himself as a top tier wrestler as he will become the face of ECW much like CM Punk was. The match it self was decent for these types of matches. Nothing really stood out, but nothing stunk either. We did get to see the beginning of the end of Miz and Morrison as they are no longer tag champs. They had a few run ins during the match in order to establish them from breaking out on their own now. These two along with Hardy and Finlay, all who were in this match tonight, should be the driving force of this brand and will most likely find themselves in the title mix going forward.
The other match of the night saw Evan Bourne take on James Curtis tonight in which Bourne’s weaknesses in technical wrestling were exposed. We all know the guy is an electrifying high risk taker, but he has to learn some grappling moves for when he takes on guys like Curtis who are more of the brawling type. Don’t take this wrong, I feel Bourne can make something of himself as the crowd already loves him. Being on ECW will allow him to hone his skills and work on some technical moves. Plus with Finlay on the roster, can you think of anyone else better to coach the youngster. It should be a interesting year watching the development of Bourne and see how far he will take his potential.
