The
Hardy Boys vs MNM
Well,
at least they went for a hot opener. Both teams are reforming for “one night
only” here, though they’d open the Rumble the following month. The match sees
the Hardys dominate at first, until some Melina interference gives MNM an
opening. They work over Matt with a nice series of double teams, and even get
Melina to give him a headscissors on the apron. Matt goes for the hot tag after
reversing a double suplex into a double neckbreaker, but MNM attack Jeff on the
apron to prevent the tag. I loved the way that the heels cockily imitate the
Hardys by hitting Poetry In Motion and attempting the Twist of Fate/Swanton
combo. However, this backfires when Matt blocks the TOF and gets the hot tag to
Jeff. We get treated to a nice dive sequence, the highlight of which is Nitro
hurling himself with reckless abandon over the top rope. The Hardys got for the
TOF/Swanton combo, but Nitro pulls Mercury out of harms way, and Jeff is soon
the face-in-peril. MNM use some strong plays from the heel handbook, using
blind tags and assaults on Matt to keep their control over Jeff. Melina even
responds viciously to “crackwhore” chants by punting Jeff in the ribs. Jeff
makes the hot tag and all Hell breaks loose. Even Melina takes one for the
team, getting accidentally dropkicked off the apron by Nitro. MNM hit the
Snapshot for two,
Matt
Striker vs Balls Mahoney
Striker
promises to make this an Extreme Rules match...”an Extreme enforcement of the
rules”. Brilliant. Striker has a picture of his face on the seat of his trunks
and we’re treated to way too many close-ups of this. Balls locks Striker in a
cross-armbreaker early to show he can go on the mat with him, so Striker
resorts to a cheap shot, before Balls hits the ringpost on a shoulder-charge.
Striker does a pretty good job working over the arm with some fun offence,
including a pretty swank roll-through into a Fujiwara armbar. Honestly, this is
a pretty decent match, with Balls doing a good selling job and Striker
perfectly fine as a smarmy heel. Balls hits some powermoves using only his good
arm, before hitting a sitout spinebuster for 3. Enjoyed this a lot.
Elijah
Burke & Sylvester Terkay vs the FBI
This
is pretty much a squash match, though the FBI do get to briefly look good. The
main aim is to get Terkay over as a monster, which he does by manhandling the
FBI, throwing Guido over the top rope onto Mamaluke. The FBI try to use their
speed advantage, downing Terkay by dropkicking his legs, but Burke hits the
Stroke on Mamaluke for an easy win.
Daivari
vs Tommy Dreamer
Like
the most disappointing Heat main event ever. Daivari bumps about for Dreamer
early doors, especially when taking a throw to the barricades. Khali interferes
to help, but gets caught by the ref and thrown out. Daivari cranks up the crowd
with a lengthy chinlock, then a second when Dreamer breaks free. Dreamer fights
back again, but Daivari blocks the DDT and rolls him up for 3. Not a PPV
encounter.
Mike
Knox & Kelly Kelly vs Kevin Thorn & Ariel
This
actually starts off pretty well, with Knox and Thorn just wailing on each
other. The crowd is dead, despite both men nailing awesome clotheslines. Knox
makes a mistake by chinlocking Thorn however, as this kills the crowd even
more. At least with the lengthy Daivari chinlocks you could argue that it
encouraged fans to cheer for Dreamer. This is a heel v heel encounter. The
girls get tagged in and somehow this gets even worse, as Kelly is at her dirt
worst here. Ariel dominates, but Kelly fires back and goes for the hot-tag,
only for Knox to leave her to her fate. Ariel uses some choke-STO to win.
Pretty horrible.
The
Big Show vs Test vs CM Punk vs Hardcore Holly vs Rob Van Dam vs Bobby Lashley
This
is an extreme elimination chamber match for the ECW title. The “extreme” comes
from the fact that there are weapons inside the pods. I should highlight here
how big Test was at this point. The man looks like a fucking tank. I should
also highlight this match is terrible. There are so many factors stopping it
from being good. I’m not even talking about the decision to replace the
advertised Sabu (who incidentally is still on the DVD case) with Hardcore
Holly, as I would rather watch Holly at this time. It’s just horribly booked
with massive logic gaps. For instance, the heel trio of Show, Test and Holly
are quite clearly in cahoots. They applaud each other when they enter the ring
and all three are henchmen of Paul Heyman. Logically, therefore, you’d assume
the faces would also try and collaborate. You’d be wrong. When Punk is released
from his pod to join RVD and Holly, he goes pretty much directly after Van Dam.
Even when Test gets in and starts choking RVD with a crowbar, Punk and RVD seem
to get paired off. This eventually leads to RVD hitting the Five Star on Punk
to eliminate him. This leaves him with Test and Holly. Luckily for RVD, Test
turns on Holly and boots him in the head to eliminate him (and they manage to
blow this pinfall, with the ref only counting two, but Holly still leaving
anyway). But there is no way RVD could have predicted that, he was instead
happily leaving himself open to a 2-on-1 situation.
The
next problem is that the match is clearly booked to get Lashley over. However,
the fans simply don’t want that. So when Test pins RVD following an awesome
elbow from the top of a pod onto RVD’s chair-coated face, the fans are left
with three men (Test, Show, Lashley) they don’t really like. Even more stupid,
Test pins RVD with time to spare before Lashley is released, leaving 30 seconds
of deadtime. This gets even longer as Heyman’s masked goons try to stop Lashley
getting in (and I’ve no idea how long they were intending on leaving him in his
pod for). Then, after Lashley pins Test following a spear, he’s left alone for 1.15
until Show is let loose. This non-action isn’t winning the fans over, as they
start chanting for a refund. Even the weapons can’t save this match, as no-one
really thinks Big Show will get to wallop Lashley with a barbed-wire baseball
bat, rendering it pointless. Some of the action is decent (That top of pod Test
elbow, the entire Punk section which re-energised the match), but by the time
Lashley wins the ECW title by spearing Show, the crowd is pissed off, bored and
ready to go. To be honest, by that point so was I. Dreadful main event.
