TNA Hardcore Justice: Hardly Anything But a Parody

This past Thursday night, Tommy Dreamer said he and the rest of his ECW crew wanted one more night to showcase what they have, to let their legacy live on forever.

Instead, the aptly named Hardcore Justice will be just another bullet in the ravaged carcass of the original Extreme Championship Wrestling.

ECW hit me at the right time. I was a teen-age pro wrestling fan looking for a product more suited to my tastes. WWF Monday Night Raw wasn't quite getting it done, and WCW Monday Nitro was a joke.

I found what I was looking for in ECW. I watched Rob Van Dam beat everyone in front of him, holding the TV Title for 23 consecutive months.

I watched Taz call Sabu out for a year straight, and I saw the evolution of one of pro wrestling's greatest characters, Raven.

Now in my mid-20s, I still see some of my favorites from the old ECW. Now, however, Taz is a bloated color commentator with graying hair.

Tommy Dreamer can't stay healthy. And Raven, one of my favorite performers of all-time, is a shell of the performer he used to be.

Dreamer said he wanted one more night for the original ECW wrestlers and fans. As much as I'd like to believe one night would help erase what has happened since 2007, it won't.

In Thursday night's promo, Dreamer mentioned the closure he got in 2005, when WWE held the first One Night Stand pay-per-view. That event was to be the only of its kind, as the name suggests.

A year later, WWE returned to the Hammerstein Ballroom for One Night Stand. The saving grace of the evening was watching Rob Van Dam, one of the faces of ECW, finally become world champion.

But from that night forward, ECW was turned into an affable parody of the outstanding product it used to be. There were no Three Way Dances, no Stairway to Hell matches, no emotional storylines, and no rabid fans in attendance.

While the venue will be small Aug. 8, and the fans will be passionate, they will not be the ECW fans who crammed into Philly's ECW Arena in the 90s.

This is a different generation of pro wrestling fans—not ones that grew up with ECW, but grew up with the stories and vintage clips of the former promotion.

Many current fans know The Dudley Boyz as Team 3D, Stevie Richards as a jobber, Taz as an announcer, and Raven as the crazy guy with the braids.

Maybe I'm a little too loyal to the old product, the old characters, and to Paul Heyman.

I may have a little more faith in this pay-per-view event if Heyman were involved. Without the mastermind behind it all, any tribute will invariably fall short of its potential.

I would love to say I think Hardcore Justice will be a success. With the wrestlers in their 40s and 50s (save Stevie Richards), and with Heyman out of the picture, it will be more a sad attempt at past glories than a re-establishment of legacy.

Many wrestlers who were a part of the original ECW say TNA has many similarities to Heyman's promotion.

I tend to agree—I would love to see TNA make the big time, but unless something drastically changes, they will always be the minor league compared to Vince McMahon and WWE.