BRM Reviews ECW Heatwave 1998

[Big Red Machine]

ECW Heatwave 1998 (8/2/1998)- Dayton, OH

JERRY LYNN vs. JUSTIN CREDIBLE (w/Nicole Bass, Jason, & Chastity)- 7/10
Awesome opener. Really did a good job getting the crowd into everything. The overbooking at the end worked perfectly for that purpose.

LANCE STORM vs. CHRIS CANDIDO (w/Tammy Sytch)- 6.25/10
A good match, but I was very confused by the face-heel dynamic here. Based on the video-package leading into the match, and the beginning of the match, it seemed like Lance was the heel (slapping Candido's injured ear, walking out on him in the middle of a match, ripping off his protective headgear, etc.) but at some point in the middle of the match, they switched with no explanation and Candido became the heel, using interference and trying to throw power in Lance's eyes.

BRAWL IN THE PARKING LOT- did its job, which was to create an excuse to put off the New Jack match.

RVD & BILL ALFONZO (& SABU) PROMO- great

MIKE AWESOME vs. MASATO TANAKA- 7.5/10

DUDLEYS PROMO- The only two who spoke were Bubba and Gertner. Gertner was good, but Bubba was GREAT!

ECW WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Rob Van Dam & Sabu(c) (w/Bill Alfonzo) vs. Jinsei Shinzaki & Hayabusa- 8/10
Awesome match.

ECW FTW HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Taz(c) vs. Bam Bam Bigelow- 8/10
Awesome brawl with an amazing finish.

DUDLEYVILLE STREET FIGHT: The Dudley Boyz (Bubba Ray, Devon, & Big Dick) (w/Sign Guy Dudley, Jeff Jones, & Joel Gertner) vs. Tommy Dreamer, Spike Dudley, the Sandman- 7.25/10
Great hardcore brawl

Overall, an awesome show from ECW, with almost everything being main event quality or better.

[badnewzxl]

Glad you enjoyed this one; this is prolly the best ECW PPV ever, too. EVERYTHING was good and a lot of things were great.

As far as the Candido/Storm thing goes, I think they were spose to be competing heels. The hell Lance Storm was pissed off that Candido caused them to lose their tag titles, so he took it out on Candido. Candido, being a member of the Triple Threat, just used his usual heel tactics. That's what I thought made this match standout on a card of AWESOME matches; it's very few times where heel v. heel works (actually, I can't think of a heel v. heel match better than this one) and they got it done. To me, the match made Storm (who came off as neutral up until then; I always thought he was gonna turn face to split from Candido, but this was better) a full fledged heel.....

[RedSon]

ECW FTW HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Taz(c) vs. Bam Bam Bigelow- 8/10
Awesome brawl with an amazing finish.

this is an amazing match, one of my favorite ECW matches