Ep. 377: The Lapsed Funk, ECW (Part 3)

You know, good for nothing, eggs sucking dumb leave it, man. We did it our way because we love it that way. We love it that way. And I have this wonderful gut feeling and I've had it all my life. When it's time to go, I take us. Now it's time to go. You know, sometimes it takes a loss to bring your life and focus and figure out actually what your goals are. And uh, I came back to the dressing room and I sat there and I sat there and I sat there, and an arm must have went by, and I looked down, and I haven't even unlaced my shoes yet. I thought about a lot of things. I thought about Tommy Dreamer. And I know I've told you people this before. Uh, there's nobody in this world that tries any harder than that guy right there. And we're all as fans, and no matter how satisfied we are with him, he just always wants to do a little bit better. And he's got the write name, and that Dreamer name. He reminds me of somebody a long, long long time ago. That person he reminds me of as my father, Dory Funk Senior, who was also a professional wrestler, and in nineteen seventy three he visited in the fifties and he had this dream. He wanted to be t champion, and that was what he wanted to do all of his life. He wanted to be the world's champion. Wrestling was his life and that was an important thing to him. But it never happened. The reason didn't happen because in nineteen seventy three June of that year, my father had a massive heart attack while he was wrestling my brother, and I rushed him to the hospital, and on the way to the hospital, he says, how much further do I have to go? And I looked at him and I knew he was in a lot of pain. I said, not much farther, Dad, just a couple more miles, and he said, Dad, come it. He says, I can't make it. I'm going. Well those were his last words, and whenever those were his last words, I figured that the Lord had good reason at taking and he did. And it was the saddest day in my brother and my life, and it'll be the saddest day of my life probably forever. Now, twenty four years later, here I am trying to figure out my goals after a loss, and what my goal is right now is that I guess I'm a dreamer too. I want to be world's champion. I know if I get in the ring against that ECW champion, if I can get in there against Raven, I know that I can beat them. I just feel it. And why do I want to do it? I thought about that too. I want to do it for all you hardcore fans out there. I want to do it for all of this old farts to prove that we don't have one foot in the grave. But most of all, I want to do it fill my father's dreams. That's what I want to do, is fulfill his dreams. Now. I know that I can't guarantee a victory, but Dad, I can guarantee that I'm not going to give up and I'm not going to quit, and I'm want to just keep on going. And if I can get him in the match, a championship match, and if I can beat him and they present me with that belt, I don't want to stand out there and say I did it my way. I want to invite every one of you ECW fans that are hitting the arena that night to come in the arena and stand with me, and I want us to hold arms in the air. And I want to invite anybody that's watching it on television to hold their arms in the air and say, we did it our way. Not like the WW We did it our way, not like the WCW. We did it our way, not like Triple A, New Japan All Japan FMW. We did it our way, not like the Ultimate Fighting Organizations. We did it our way. And what is our way? That's the ECWA. And what is the ECWA. It's the only way because it's the most physical, dangerous form of wrestling in the world today, bar none. We did it our way because we love it that way. We love it that way. That's where it comes from. Mm hmm. Early Legal nineteen ninety seven, the first ECW pay per view, Terry Funk once again becomes ECW World Champion, completing not just the chapter of a story they decided to reintroduce him with upon his return to the company after a quick sojourn in another semi retirement in nineteen ninety five, but also, but also you know, in so many ways, finishing this chapter about Funk and ECW and what the two meant to each other here on the lapsed Funk. We're glad you could be here with us, and Boss, we've gotten do you say are you saying? He finished the story? He finished the story. That's how you do it, by the way, in case you're yeah, you just do it our way. He finished the story, and it's uh. It's a time of tremendous enthusiasm and anxiety at ECWS. They tried their first pay per view and all of the different risks that come along with that. They they've never done a live television show before ever, think about it. Wow, you know, not only have they not done a pay per view, they've never been live before. There are performers that are only used to, you know, going out there, you know, before a live crowd and then getting a little touch put on it before hits television or hits home video. Francine the Valet was terrified backstage, just depicted quickly and beyond the mat about going out there because she had never been on a live television show before, and Terry Funk he'd been on plenty, and so that and so many other reasons. He leads ECW into a landmark knight for them and the last leg of not only his journey in ECW, but I think we can say in a lot of ways the journey of Extreme Championship Wrestling as a co sure sure? And where where does where do we land on? What doorstep do we land on? Here? Your sense boss? After two episodes, now plumb plumbing the depths a fund of ECW. It's been a lot from from Eddie Gilbert to Foley. Yes, where are you at on it in terms of what? In terms of do you get why Terry Funk meant a lot to e c W? Or do you think it was beneath him? Hear him wax poets? Okay, I can tell you this. I can tell you this. This is what I'll I'll phrase it. I can see how important Terry Funk was to e c W. But was it beneath Terry Funk? Yes? Wow, we have to reach conclusions on a journey like this. We have to otherwise it's not really worth that much, is it. I mean, because here's the thing, here's the thing like this is this is how I feel about it. Without Terry Funk. There is no ec W without ECW. There certainly is a Terry Funk. Oh, for sure. And I mean he was established obviously way earlier now in terms of people who and in and in many ways, you know, I I I look sadly upon him during this era where he's beating himself and just allowing an atrocious amount of brutality for the sake of a paycheck. Like and again, I take no respect away from the fact that he was able to reinvent himself in this way. That takes guts, that takes a lot of sacrifice, that takes a lot of ability and thought and foresight and and whatnot. That being said, you know, I can't help but feel sorry, you know, I mean, honestly, the the the quote that is in the the director's commentary of Beyond the mat that actually has stuck with me from this day forward is when he says to Barry Blaustein, you know, I wish I'd take him a job at Walmart, Yeah, or something like that, you know, like it's the idea that you know, he could have had a retirement. He could have he could have at some point seen it. And he knows that no matter what you love, you know, if there comes a moment where you can't set it aside. For whatever reason. That's that's I don't know. I mean, that's just that's how I feel about it. It's a demonstration of commitment, but it might have a note of sadness to it, because what is it that Terry Funk still needs out of professional wrestling, right after all the decades and all of the different milestones we've charted that he that he reached and all the different high points, Because he clearly doesn't want to be, you know, a company man anywhere, So what is his expectation? What is it he's reaching for? And I think in that promo we just played, there's a bit of it. It's this idea that he wants to go down to somebody that's thought of as a legend on his own terms, somebody who no one else can claim credit for his being a legend. And that is true. Yeah, anybody on your ww mount Rushmore, someone's going to make the case that Vince McMahon made it possible, or that a writer working with them made it possible, or that his opponent's made it possible. No one's going to say that about Turdfunk because you can't because he wouldn't allow it. And that's what he means when he says, we did it our way. Yeah, But the thing is he could have done that without ECW. I don't think so. You don't think so. No. I can't see any other place he could have done that. No, no, No, I'm saying he could have. He could have gone out you know, he could have gone out his way without ECW, like he could have still retired that way as being not a company guy, as being a guy who who always did it himself and made himself Without ECW, I think conceptually it's true, But what I'm saying is he wouldn't have had a platform to let that sink in. He wouldn't have had a place that people would go to receive that message about him. He would have just had to go out into obscurity and hope that people realize that. He wouldn't have had ace where he could look into the camera and cut a promo, a five minute promo like we just heard, explaining exactly you know, what's in his heart, or at least what occurs to him is the most heartfelt thing he can say to sell the next match. Yeah, you know, I don't think there was another place he could have gone to express these things so that we have words to go back to, even if they're you know, half true, half fiction pro wrestling promos, but at least get the thrust of what it was he was trying to communicate. I just I don't know. I just think that as as kind of an ill fit as it was, ECW was the place for the Funker to settle his legacy. It was a place uniquely constructed to allow him to show things and to have the liberty to show things that no one else would allow him to show and say things that no one else would necessarily give him the platform and time to say. So here we are grappling with it, and we're going to go all the way through Terry Funk winning the ECW World Championship in the main event of the very first pay per view ever barely legal, of course, and a bit beyond that, because the ramifications of that show and ECW in general would carry all the way through even into WWE's at first exciting and quickly ill fated relaunch of VCW in the mid two thousands. Because you better believe the Funker's phone was ringing from Stanford, Connecticut on that one, and did he go well like always with the Funker, a little bit of yes and a little bit of no. We can say we can say he went ahead, boss, I think we can say he went ahead. He goes that's true, he goes ahead. He went ahead, and he will always be ahead. He'll always be ahead. And when we last left you, we, of course we're talking a lot about Terry Funk and mcfoley's interactions in the ECW ring, with flaming branding irons, flaming chairs, scores of chairs being thrown into the ring, lawsuits over fans being burned in the process, wild and silly and intense promos all over the place. And we even left you with a what a wonderful little treat that was Mick Foley himself. Yeah, was quick on the draw responding to a cameo where we sat a little bit of color because we realized there was kind of a dearth of the specifics we're used to really sinking our teeth into here at the Lapsed Fan about that trial where a fan sue DCW for being burned during the the Terry Funk Nick Foley flaming chair mishap in the e CW Arena in nineteen ninety five, and we do hope you you stuck it out to the end of our last episode of The Lapsed Funk to hear that, boss, I know you were tickled pink by it. That was it was great. It was great to hear him. I mean, I think the location and the setting events a lot, really fucking does a lot. The fact that he's it's like, wait a minute. I mean, look, I'm sure we although he did it very fast, so I like, within within a couple hours he responded right to our to our request. Yeah, he takes pride in that. It seems like I'm gonna say he probably wasn't doing a bunch of them. So it wasn't like like, Nick, why couldn't you just pull over? I listen for the for the inner sertainment value, it's great, Like why couldn't you wait till you get after till after you get your coffee, which he paid five American dollars for, by the way, Like wait, wait till you get your coffee and pull off to the place you were going to pull off. I don't recommend or driving through while cameoing he said cameo verb, I mean, yeah, I don't. I don't. I don't recommend it either. I won't to do a coffee while talking, though maybe he had to be here quick. I mean, he wasn't home. He was going to a show. Christ, he was going to a he was going to ov w oh y. That's why he said this, right, Yeah, but yeah, he had some funny memories of the trial itself. He did. He was actually happy to be asked about it. And this is just a perfect illustration of why TLFX is so powerful. We didn't I didn't realize in researching all of this because it didn't occur to me in the timeline that Foley's second book would have talked all about the trial. It didn't even occur to me because I'm thinking of it as a nineteen ninety five thing, right, but it's not. It's a two thousand really the trial, right. And I would figure the extent of what he would say would be contained to his first book, because you know, a lawsuit would kind of chill him from saying much more in book form about the whole thing. But I was very wrong, and huge shout out the Lapse Fan Solar System member Dan for pointing this out so quickly that we could bring this extra bit of a clarity and color to the very next episode of The Lapsed Funk. Here. This is why it's powerful, because we cannot be stopped if people have our backs like this from a research oh yeah, oh yeah, I mean, you know, I from doing under the cinemat we float something. We say, find a wrestling connection in this movie, and we can go to bed comfortable knowing that even if we can't find it in the hours of the day, we have available to us that if it's there, the power of this community will find it. Something's going to do it. And that's real. I mean, it's happened time and believe again, I've been saying over the ten years of the show, if we reach a point on any episode where something we're talking about, you know, reach a sort of a dead end in terms of like an unanswered question, be sure to listen to the next episode because chances are that if it's something we happen to miss, or something we couldn't find or have access to, or something we wouldn't have known to look for. Members of the Solar System, these are the smartest listeners of any wrestling podcast. You're going to find smart from the perspective of mission driven. You know, like there's they share with us the notion that there really is no reason to press record unless you're going to say something definitive and final about a subject matter. You know, you're going to set down a definitive history that everyone will begrudgingly have to acknowledge. Is probably what we saw it with the Iron Claw, the best way to walk through something of deep and multifaceted interest in the history of the business. Yes, and we're doing it again with perhaps the greatest wrestler of all time in Terry Funk, and certainly, as we've said, the most consequential career in the history of the business in Terry Funk. And Dan stepped right up. He said, no, you know what. It's in fully second book, and god damnit he's right, which, for some questionable reason, is not available in kindle form, even though it sort of lists itself as such. Yeah, it's it's really the I think I got it one time. It's a very weird it's like a scan. Oh really, it's got taken down. I thought I had it, and I didn't have it in a digital form. I certainly have the hard copy. I read it when it came out. Yeah, but again, this is just an illustration of the kind of thing we're celebrating around here at TLFX. You've been hearing the TLFX recollections. Members of the Solar System sending us audio files just delineating precisely what tlf has meant to them and why they think we've stayed long and hard for ten years. And we encourage anybody in the Solar System to send similar recollections to our email address, the Lapsed Fan at gmail dot com. Just attach a bit of audio talk read into your phone. We don't really care about quality or fidelity, although it's all excellent on the qualities, excellent on phones, but please send it along and we'll take it out of consideration in terms of whether you might be the lucky Solar System member of the week to get the chance to explain why we're here TLFX style and this sort of a backup that we have from the research community and just being totally unafraid to acknowledge when we've missed something or when we've been wrong. It's just it's the real secret sauce. And so we want to encourage folks to keep in mind that coming up on January twentieth, folks of the Solar System, some of the strongest members of the Solar System who've coalester in a term, the lapsed power Plant, are again holding International LATS day LATS, which stands for Last Archive Transcription Service, which is basically the complete transcription of every word we've ever said on the cast in all of our different formats. And you know, when you think about TLFX, you think about what are the best moments, What are your favorite personal moments? What are the moments where the cast, you know, had you almost veer off the roaded laughter, stop and keep contemplation, have a wild ah moment while grocery shopping, whatever, you know, we make meaning out of the drudgery that is necessary to live a moral life in this world. And so those moments are what we're looking for you to put your finger on in terms of you know, you remember it, but you don't know exactly what it is. Maybe you have the time, and that's great, you know exactly what episode it was, and you can go back and listen to it whenever you want, maybe VI even isolated it on your device or whatever. That's great. But what International LATS day is for on January twentieth, Saturday. January twentieth is going to be a chance for anyone who does remember something that was special to them in the history of a catalog, but really has no way of finding it or no idea of how to find it. These folks from the power Plant will be at the ready throughout the day on January twentieth to receive your inquiries via X via many other formats. We're going to announce kind of all the different ways that you can post inquiries. I would say acts is probably the best one. But you can send in requests like hey, I remember vaguely something like this, this and that, and members of the power plant will be ready to respond quickly and immediately with the time codes that hopefully bring you where you need to be. It's absurd, it's an amazing it's an amazing thing. It's something I never expected. You know, you think about doing this for ten years without a design on doing you certainly don't intend on never stopping, right. But there comes a point where like giving people email us and they say, like I can, I can never catch up. There's not enough. It's inhumanly, humanly impossible, because you think about how many hours there are and it's like, yeah, that's that's that's when you reach the point where it's like the people who have listened forever even they have no chance of rediscovering those things that that hit them, but they didn't mark down when help we shit, I think you're going to test as well as I can. But we we've we've gone over things and said things and come up with bits that I forgot all about that. I mean that socials some points out to us were like really we said that, and we sure did. I've told you, I've told I said it a million times and you know, the moment, the moment it's over, it's gone, it's out of my mind. Like there's very how it has to be when you're doing something like this. There are very few times that I have actually sat and remembered moments as being moments, and you know, I think, like, honestly, there are there are only two off the top of my head that that always that that kind of stuck out to me, and that was move the cow. Oh see that's a wild random one. Yeah yeah, yeah, move the cow and then and then stop the boots. And that's just as much to do with the follow up we got telling us that the landed as it did our own personal experience of you know, doing it as it happened. It's as much about the emails and the tweets and the stuff we heard after that that told us that was wild, that was funny. I remember someone came up with a brilliant animation, Evince pitching move the Cow to Terry Taylor. It was on YouTube. Remember that, Yes, yes, probably so, yeah, probably is. That's a great And what I love is that. What I'm less interested in is what I feel like moments stand out because that's arbitrary. That's sort of like you know when that I laugh hardest. But really what it's about is what moments come up enough that I remember them. I feel like I don't have my own moments. I just have the moments everyone keeps reminding me of, right right, right, It's it's someone inauthentic as the host, because you know you're you're in receipt of all these signals. What interested in is what hit you, because what you'll find Our great pal Blake loved the bit where we did the sturge of South Dakota mayor for real wild and he remembers everything we said about that, remember it at all. We came up with a ton of bits, and I'm laughing my ass off realizing how far we went with Mayor Clifford Lynn, ladies and gentlemen, fucking I mean, a palm of waiting to be greased, like an axle on a motorcycle. I mean, it's all you never know whose turn it is. It's exactly right because we don't either. But right right, we open up an article that has to do with, you know, setting up the location shoot for an under the cinemat movie, and there's somebody in there who made a comrade in the local paper. It's his turn in the Santa Rosi CA Yep, yep. So that's what we love. We love like, yeah, this was my little moment. Yes and International LATS Day. If you don't know where in the catalog it sits, is a chance to find it quickly, efficiently, and if their ingenuity is any indication, they could even pull the clip and post it and wreck time. So it'd be a really fun time. Because what we're doing throughout TLFX is trying to really get a master list of moments that meant something to somebody you know moment and we can kind of get an idea. Okay, this moment meant a lot, meant the most to this many people, and kind of creating a rank order of great TLF moments, because that's the kind of thing you do upon a tenth anniversary. So it's all part of that wider effort, that wider initiative. But do circle that in your calendar. It's not a big lift, but just know that that's a particular day to get an answer, and just look at our Twitter to find out our x account to find out wherever that is. So again, big shout out to Dan for being in the spirit of TLF and pointing out immediately that we should turn our attention to make Foley's book. If people do this, man, we will always be undefeated. But I'm going to convey what Mick says about the trial because it does get us quite a ways and setting up, you know, a Terry Funk that's now going a little bit past that era in ECW. It's now going to be boss less about Funk coming out and loading the ring up with chairs and lighting fire to things and just doing, you know, doing the kind of things to get easy on the map. Now, it's like, let's let the story settle in of this desperado, this guy who's you feel like he's got nothing left winning the title. Yep. I had a chance to see our legal system at work in May of two thousand, Foley Rights when I was a defendant in a lawsuit filed by a fan based on an October nineteen ninety five incident at thecwre And in Philadelphia. The fan received first and second degree burns. Interesting, I only think Foley said first degree burns in the video. He sent us in another recollections first and second degree burns on his hands and face as a result of the incident, and was treated at the hospital and released less than forty minutes later. When I saw the fan in the dressing room, he appreciated. He appeared not only calm, but almost ecstatic at having been the center of attention. Indeeds, go Mick, that's right. It was freely taking the credit, in fact, for putting out Terry Funk, who had accidentally caught on fire during the match. That was the last I saw of the fan until we stepped into that court room ten months after the fire incident. The fan William Sanborne. See, I don't know, man. It's very clear to me from the court records that his name was Schweitzer, it was not Sandborn. I don't know if that's an attempt to, you know, protect the guy, or to move people from being able to look up the case or what's going on there. But I don't know where that name comes from. Perhaps there was another person that was burned in this thing and two people sued them out. Doubt it. It's first time I've ever heard that name. Had been involved in a terrible motorcycle accident that resulted in the amputation of one leg. In over a dozen operations and all, he was in the hospital for over a month, one week of which was spent in a coma. Despite the severity of his injuries, it was his his attorney's contention that the ECW incident had caused greater mental duress and more pain and suffering. I found that to be ridiculous. I wish that Sandborn had come to ECW with the facts, or at least the facts as I believe them to be. See, I don't have any Despite the severity of his injuries, it was an attorney's contention that the incident caused greater mental dress. I guess see we made the supposition based in other things that had been blogged about that he tried to connect the motorcycle accident to the dress caused by the burn right. But here at seem quite mick saying. Is it was a choice between suing like somebody for the motorcycle accident or suing ECW, and he chose to sue ECW instead of the motorcycle accident. So I'm excused about that bizarre But again, as we said last week, the court file has been destroyed in that case. So unless somebody has their hands on paper, which you know, you know what to holler at. The teams are open, motherfucker. You know they're always open. I don't know if we're going to get it down to the bottom of that. I wish that Sanborn Folly Rights had come to ECW with the facts, or at least the facts as I believe them to be. Look, I was at your building and I got burned. Sure I'd had a few beers, and sure I reached over to the guardrail, but I was trying to keep out and I got burned. I have no doubt that had he done so, he would have gotten a Salt mall settlement, and more importantly, received what seemed to be a lot most importance to him at the time, free tickets for a life. Oh he's naelling this guy? Oh man, I love it. Well, yeah, I mean, you know, the first thing I would say if someone came after me, like you got to say someone's coming after you, you know, all you're going to do is you know you want to tear him back, especially if you win, you know, right. Point out how at the time he wasn't so worried about it. Instead, Sanborn let his lawyers present him as an innocent victim, someone who was minding his own business when a burning chair flew onto him in the crowd. Sandborne, they claimed, was then pushed onto the burning chair and was an emotional wreck afterward, so emotional that he hung out in the back and asked for free t shirts after the so emotional that he was able to drive his truck with a stick shift home that night. Wow fully knows that the stick shift, That's right, That's how gotten who he was by all this? Only Nick, come on, we sweating mackey your he thought this could have ruined him. I thought that was wild, Like I don't know what kind of judgment they were looking at, but ww legal calling him up like all stern and like worried about it's wild. I took the stand in the third day of the trial. I saw his counsel pull out my book, which he proceeded to quote from as if it were gospel. I will reprint a few pages of the incident from Heaven Nice day so that you can gain a better knowledge of the incident question and also familiarize yourself with what I was hearing on the witness stand. I should point out that there was one lie printed in the story of the fire he writes the second time. Keep this in mind as you read, and try to picture the attorney reading in a decidedly unpleasant voice, especially concerning profanities, which he made extra grating. After every profanity, he would apologize to both the judge and the jury. It's clear that it was my offensive language and not his. There's a great story Boss from remember I mentioned the mass transit lawsuit where new Jack cut open that kid and the Yes. There's a great moment that new Jack talks about where Paul Hayman takes the stand and he's performing for the jury. He's working. He's not lying, I don't think, but he's working. He's he's exaggerating things to get the jury to feel sympathy for new Jack. And there does come a point I guess where the guy I think this is after the incident had happened. I'm almost positive that the kid's father uses a racial slur towards New Jack and his rage. And Paul Hayman milks that moment where the attorney insists that Paul say the word that was used, and he looks at new Jack and he goes, Jack, I'm sorry, and he looks down, he holds his hand, you know, his head in his hands, and he called him up and he says the word and new Jack, oh Jack, it said took all he could he can handle. The nuts bust out laughing and how like how dramatic Paul made that moment seem and right turns a jury he you know new Jack because he's the biggest storyteller room all. But he says he noticed, like one of the black guys on the juror perk right up at that one. Because it's it's serving its purpose, it's making the people look at the right the accuser in a different light. It's making the accuser look like someone who is in an entirely an entirely you know, angelic person delivered innocently into the scenario, which plays a lot with juries. You know, even though there has nothing to do with the incident, it happened after the incident. You still, you know, in a civil case like this, you still attack character. For sure. It's always I mean, it's it's always seems like it's best to make sure that the jury likes you. Yeah, it's always best to make sure that the jury sees your accuser as somebody who might be putting on it, might be exaggerating other things in his or her life. And who's to say he's not exaggerating this as well? It can hurt if you can find a way to make that point, to make it even if the thing they're exaggerating is tangentially related to the incident itself, you still say it, Oh, you drove a stick shift, you know that kind of thing. Yeah, so fully reprints what we read last time from the first book, which of course is fucking you know, landmark text in wrestling history. Oh, for sure, Red cover to cover Needless to say, the guy had read a few pages from my book but had managed to completely crap on the spirit in which was written fully right. So I had seen the guy operate the past few days and had to admit that he was very good. Shortened, stocky with a suit that looked good. Two ties is too small. Used a bully approach with witnesses. He would seek out the slightest discrepancy between witness testimony and depositions taken a year earlier, and an attempt to exploit it, as well as a witness's own nerves and insecurities. I knew that he would attempt with this with me as well. Several minutes into his inquisition, he asked me about the accuracy of quotes that I had attributed to several people. I informed him that I had written about the incident several years after it took place and was using my memory and creative license to attribute quotes. Aha, he thought he had his opening creative license. Huh, mister Foley, imagine if this guy had Diana hart Smith on the fucking standing box. I wonder that thing got pulled and thided, oh man, he wouldn't be able to get fucking two feet away, he bellowed, while making those stupid quotation marks in the air with his fingers that should be reserved only for doctor Evil. From then on, every question was followed up with is that true, mister Foley? Or are you using creative license with the annoying finger quotes. Finally I cracked and admitted that there was one small lie in my have a nice day story. He jumped all over me like Clinton DNA on a gap dress. So you're telling me that you lied in your book, Yes, sir, you're telling me that you have deceived this jury by passing off your book. Is the truth when an actuality you knowingly lied? Yes, sir, mister Foley, you swore in this courtroom to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. So help you God, do you remember that, Yes, sir? I looked at the judge. Her eyes were locked on me. I looked at the jury. For the past two and a half days, they had looked attentive but completely humorless. I had not seen a single one smile during the proceedings. For the first several minutes, I had seemed so sure of myself, But now this legal genius. This master of the spoken word had me on the ropes. Then he made a mistake. In the legal drama of a civil action, John Travolta's character lawyer character admits to making the mistake of asking a question that he doesn't know the answer to. Apparently this attorney hadn't seen the movie because he made them the same mistake. Mister Foley, would you care to tell the members of the jury what part of your story is true? Are you sure? Yes, mister Foley, give us the truth. Don't use creative license the last finger quotations, did it? He deserved to be made a full love. The lawyer had served up a big fat softball, and I intended to hit it out of the park. Well, Sir, Terry really never did call bishoff ahmo, which surprises me to hear cameo and to read here, yeah, because I had always heard that. You know that that was the whole line that got fully to come out from the back. If I guess you just invented that in the moment. We'll never know, because the tape disappeared or was destroyed or otherwise commandeered, which is something that despite reaching out to Mick and reading from the book. We still don't know what happened to the tape or if said tape exists, because they certainly were filming it. It was an easy w arena show. Awi filmed all those things, but no tape survived or in existence, So I don't know what he said to get what Terry Funk said to get Mick Foley to come out with the flaming chair and start this whole thing. But it apparently wasn't Bischoff as a homo. But he still you know, as we played that clip from the roast of Terry Funk when mcfoley was holding cord, he repeated the thing again without any proviso about it being a lie or or dressing up the moment. I think it was. There was some wrestler who was quoted as saying, you know, if if a story is worth telling, it's worth exaggerating. Well, I'm looking at the uh yeah, he says that that that Foley says that Hayman said. The footage of the incident is destroyed. See if we get there, I don't think it's in here. It could be wrong. All right, let let's look again. The jurors broke out and laughter and even the judge chuckled. The tough guy attorney first part looked like he wanted a quality the way. Have you ever seen the movie Anatomy for Anatomy of a Murder? An Anatomy for a Murder? No, it's with It's with Jimmy Stewart. It's very good. It's a very good movie. Auto Premager as well. There's a moment just like that at the end of the movie. Yep, yeah, where like this, this expert, you know, fancy schmancy lawyer thinks he's got the fucking win and thinks he's got you know, uh, Jimmy Stewart's case, you know, all all fucked up, and it gets totally totally flipped on its head. We love to see that, don't We buy some by a comment just like this. I don't want to spoil it for you, because it's a really good movie and I think you should watch it. I check it out as soon as possible. We love to see people with unearned confidence eat shit. We'd love to see everybody, yes, yes, but we feel a little bit more virtuous about it when we see someone with unearned confidence. Yes, exactly. Unearned confidence is exactly it I want shit to be eaten. That's why we love the trial of his life so much. Jerry mcdebitt going up there with the howitzer on Gary Wadler. You know, Oh you're an expert, sir, huh, what about this? What about anavard from the market ord? Exactly? Well, doctor patient relationship. Buh, there's doctor bas right, Member's just there stuff that I can't tell him. I definitely needed a patient relationship to listen to some of that testimony, that's for sure. The jurys broke out and laughter with the tough okay. Five days later, the verdict arrived. I had been wearing the same suit for every session and had tried to fool the jury by switching ties. The poor funker looked exhausted. He had feared the worst, and the worst he felt could be pretty bad. Indeed, Terry felt that the jury might well look at us and assume we were loaded, and then look at that poor bastard without a leg and pretty much give him everything we'd ever worked for. I thought he was being a little paranoid, but I certainly felt like I was going to have to open up the purse strings and waved by by to several years worth of money saved on the road. Before excusing the jury to make their decision, the judge had informed them that their job was to determine who was the most at fault. If the plane of Sandborne had been more than fifty percent to blame for his injuries, she explained, they would not have to award damages. The jury returned and my heart started pounding. I had been calm for the duration of the trial, but now the reality of the situation was sinking in. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, do you find Extreme Championship Wrestling liable for mister Sandborne's injuries? No, we don't, Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. Do you find Paul Hammery w owner liable for mister Sanborne's injuries? No, we don't. Ladies and gentlemen the jury. Do you find Terry Funk liable for mister Sanborne's injuries? No, we don't. This left only one. When the ten seconds it took to ask the question to get the answer, I foresaw the worst. All the blame is going to be placed on me. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. Do you find Michael Foley liable for mister Sanborne's injuries. Drum roll, please, no, we don't. Yes, yes, and a half years I could find, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, do you find mister Sanborn responsible for his own injuries? We do guilty, Ladies and gentlemen. Do you believe that, under a little observed but perhaps here hyper relevant part of Pennsylvania penal code, that as a result of bringing this frivolous civil case against these fine folks, that mister Sanborn should be sentenced to death in the state of Pennsylvania. We do your honor. That's how my movie would end. The whole movie would be about the chair incident. It would be like a very faithful recounting and reimagining of the actual chair thing, and a question of liability and a question of risk, and a question of you know, how far we go for spectacle. And at the very end I would add a twist where he's put to death the person to his burg. I mean, the best part is is that it's the person who's suing it, I mean, right, And we find out the whole the world in which they all operated was just a totally asked backwards fucking like you know, totalitarian vis like they can fucking change it up and like and declare the the you know, declare the plaintiff guilty. Right, he didn't do he's bringing up charges on what grounds? Is he getting the chair? And then of course I would have him strapped into the chair. In the closing scene and before they flipped the switch, someone shoots him in the head, and that's the end, and no one Harry Funk does, Terry Funk does? He went ahead and right the guy who was like had his forehead on the desk because he was so relieved that he'd been not found guilty of you know, owing this guy like, you know, two hundred thousand dollars he murdering the guy. Oh, it's funny. This left this left only me. Okay we read that. Yes, yes, after four and a half years, I could finally put this thing to the rest. I was finally free, free to light more chairs on fire, free to burn more fans, what the hell. I was free to relax with a big thick stake and a victorious plane ride home. I couldn't help it feel bad for Sanborne and his wife as they sadly walked away. I also couldn't help it feel a little sad for our justice system and how it can be abused. During my time in the court room, had witness testimony that differed from our recollection of the events, bullying of weaker witnesses, taking quotes out of context, misrepresenting facts, and not substantiating claims. Yes, indeed, the United States league system can be you got it, faker than professional wrestling. The funker gets off, indeed he does well. I want I hadn't gone off. Yeah, but enough enough about the hotel room, Terry, I want ahead and told Vicky I wanted to get had Rick. Yeah. I just want you to know if there's been a break in the proceedings were about to go back in the courtroom. The jurist reached a verdict. I just want you to know, VICKI that you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, hold on, yeah, that's one. That's one quirk I picked up on since the last year. Like they're asking him questions and a shoot and he goes, yeah, yeah, that's exactly how it happened. And you know what, and get had and spread spread. I just want you to know, VICKI, if they find me guilty, there's there's five thousand dollars hidden in the jar from the insane clown Posse in the kitchen, Vicky, I just want you to know that if I, if I get found guilty, I'm gonna go ahead and go to jail. Oh how inspiring. I want to know that if they go if there's a judgment against me, instead of paying it, I'm just gonna throw myself off a mountain. I'm gonna get in dunks tractor and we're gonna see what happens. I'm gonna I'm gonna get in dunks tractor. I'm just gonna drive and see where I go instead of paying this guy, he takes off at a John Deere down the Panhandle and he's just like in the desert, like and he's going like ten miles an hour. Oh went ahead, Yeah there's a song. You better believe there's a song for that moment. He's fucking singing it. Oh went ahead, to go ahead? Oh I went ahead, and now I'm dead. Well, what's been one of the highlights of the of the journey his Japan song album, So we should come out with our own from Time Life, Our Time Lapsed Fan. There's a particular there's a particular there's a particular there's a particular, particular, particular, particular particular particularly t l F a particular podcast, Get it drawed Up, Progressing Teas dot Com, Slash, the Lapsed Fan, Come in your Way Yep, courtesy of Holt mclaney who plays Fritz Fan Eric and the Iron Claw and who if you if you missed it, acknowledge that a huge part of this preparation was this very podcast, called it a particular podcast. I mean, I'm going to say it. I've said it before. There is no other audio recollection like ours that's got people who are denial about that. It had to hurt to hear Holt say that, you know that had to and I feel bad. I know they had a tough day that day. But look we talk. Look look there is no I mean, I the only reason I know that. I mean, you know, maybe now it's different after we did our stuff, but I I went and looked. I hunted. I wanted to know as much as I possibly could about and there's nothing. There was nothing that could get for a few a few you know, Kevin von Erick interviews, but that's it. There was no in what sense that about any kind of behind the scenes, any kind of story of world class nothing. Oh yeah, yeah, in terms of like resources people could call upon, Yeah yeah, I mean really, it's in the documentaries obviously. You know, there's nothing more than we had to work with when we did Limitable Tragedy. Really. Yeah, there's the Dark Side episode, which is really good. Didn't really unveil too much new, not to say they didn't collect new, but they had to tell the story. You know, it's not it's not a mission of let's make sure we only say things no one's heard before, because that would really be confus using. Yeah, right, but yeah, pretty much nothing else. So it makes a lot of sense. And you know, no one relentlessly keyed in on Fritz being like, you know, Fritz's psyche being the real story here. It certainly even pointed out, but we were like, we're not going to rest until anything anyone's ever said about this man's mind and way of operating in the world is conveyed, and speaking of watching someone like a hawk and absorbing their every thought and instinct. Tommy Dreamer, who Terry Funk called out in that promo we played at the top of the episode, and who was key to the story of getting Terry Funk into that ECW title position at Barely Legal nineteen ninety seven, which of course is one of our very first podcasts. When we first launched the thing, I think it was number six or something like that, covering the first DCW show, the paper Back. It might have been a little bit after that, but it was. It was early. It was right before we It was when we did our Chairman's Choice. Yeah, we look at each other for journeys, like, are you pick one that I'll pick one? Well, well, we had we were like when we decided to do when you propose the idea of doing the WrestleMania Journey, we had about four weeks of shows in between, and we're like, well, let's just fucking because I mean, I don't know if this has been said on but we were gonna do maybe we did the years ago, but we were going to do you know, we were when we used to pick it out of the hat, which you know we do sometimes anyway, but we had a WrestleMania six coming up as the next one and we were days away from recording it. You didn't realize it, yeah, and you were like, we shouldn't do this, We should do all WrestleManias back to back starting at this date because we had yet to do because we had to do a single one, although we had done eighty five. Yeah, yess yeah, we had done yes, but uh so so yeah, and so that's why we did uh Tuesday and Texas afterwards instead, because it was a short show, wouldn't take too long to watch and and get under our belt. And then we were like, all right, let's just do these, you know four, Well, we'll go back back and forth with shows and of our choice. Something tells me many more of these TLFX history lessons to come in twenty twenty four, I think so, but so barely legal is available in the archives, our coverage of it, if you're looking forward. I think we even resurfaced it the week Terry passed and put it up on the main feed. We might be get a game matter and that in Great American Bash ninety six over your two choices, Wow, yeah, bishoff through the table. Yeah man, Well we had the whole world open to us. You know, we could just go right for the heart, you know, right for the episode that yep, yep, we could do without rewatching, right yep, yep. So Tommy Dreamer. Basically, the story is that he had a shot at the ECW title that he gifted to Terry Funk at barely legal or at least a shot in the three way dance to get the title shot later in the show or immediately after the match, and so that was like his his final act of benevolence to a Terry Funk that you know, this was his maker die moment, his make or break moment. And there had been a lot of you know, association between the two and ECW storyline since ninety five. They had tagged together, they had battled together, and you know, the audience was told and it was true. I mean hear Terry Funk talk about it and shooting interviews years later. It was true. There was a mentor mentee relationship, but you were Terry Funk and Tommy Dreamer, because in Tommy Dreamer he saw somebody that not just you know, had what Funk saw as the goods in the ring, but also had the spirit like he had keeping the Amilla territory alive after his dad died, of actually minding the territory, not just being a performer, but doing the kind of things that made sure that you know, ECW could return to buildings, making sure that ECW wrestlers were coordinated, and making sure, you know, logistics were in place, and trying to learn every aspect of the business for no other reason than to make sure that he and the people he cared about continued to have a place to work. Which, you know, that's a lot to ask of a wrestler. It's not a knock against a wrestler if he just shows up, does his job well, and takes the check and goes back to the room and blows it on coke. But you know, the Funk felt compelled to point these these qualities out about Tommy Dreamer, which weren't necessarily evident to the fans. You know, he Tommy Dreamer had quite an uphill climb to get over with that ECW crowd. They were very unforgiving in his early days when he kind of portrayed like a you know, a suspender's wearing pretty boy character that was not working. And as time when it basically took him, you know, with a bare back just getting cracked with the Singapore cane hundred times by the Sandman. Something that the fans had to acknowledge was an absolutely brutal initiation to go through for the sake of an angle. And look, that's what works to the ECW crowd. That's why they love the Funker. They saw him go out there and risk life and limb and you wonder why you do it, and then you see, well, on the other side, they'll stick with you for years and years and you'll be over and you'll stay paid in ECW. Not well necessarily, although those guys made a little bit more than you would think at the top one hundred thousand plus, one hundred and fifty plus for the Van Dams and the Saboos and the Tazes and the Sandman's and the Funkers. I'm sure at a certain point Todd Gordon talked about like Funk's salary was so much out of the stratus fudite of the other guys in the roster that you wouldn't believe it. But really, yeah, man, I'm not surprised, but yeah, and you have to, you know, bring the scale way way down. We're talking the early Stern Championship days. But yeah, saying Terry Funk, he named his price. He wasn't some guy that was going to be convinced to do something for less than what he felt like working for because of some ethic he was business. I mean, we played that clip from Paul Hayman on the Bump upon Terry Funk's passing at the very beginning of the ECW leg of the journey, and that was pretty much what he said. He was somebody that was always able to combine passion with business and never let one overwhelm the other. And that's that rare balance that's so hard to strike in this business. But it's absolutely necessary to survive in this business because the seconding let your passion take over your your business sense, then you'll be taking advantage of until you hate the business. You know, that's just the way it's going to be. So this is happening. This is definitely a through line in these salad days for Extreme Championship Wrestling. The relationship between Tommy Dreamer and Terry Funk and growing up in New York Yonkers, Tommy Dreamer watched Terry Funk as a WWF fan and he actually didn't see a whole lot of whole hell of a lot that he liked at the time, which is really yeah, which is kind of aut That tells you a lot about when you're a young kid wrestling fan, like you don't even appreciate who the best ones are that you're watching because you hate them. You hate the best course, right because they're great. Mmm. I mean I've seen him wrestling on shows. I saw him like wrestling Master Square Guard against the Junkyard Dog. I growing up, I hated Terry Funk. I could not stand him. I didn't like anything that he represented. I was a huge Dusty Rhodes fan, and only till I started getting into the business that I realized how great Terry Funk was because he made me hate him so much. You know, he was mainly a heel every place I saw him, and like, I was never impressed by him. But then when you get in the business and you realize, like guys like Adrian Adonis were like phenomenal workers, Harley Race, Terry Funk and like you watched, I mean, you're like, wow, that's Terry Funk and he was unbelievable and like he always did Terry always did memorable stuff, like everywhere he went and then that's it. I mean, from pouring oil on his head in Florida and like egg sucking dog with Dusty Rhodes. I remember I saw that like as a kid, and I was screaming, that's Terry. I hated him, pile driving Rick Flair so much stuff that you're just you know, you go back and you've had an amazing career. Plastic bag, plastic bag on Rick Flair. That was the one that nearly got us kicked off the National But answering, I only met him ew That's where I first met him. Uh, you know, I'm being very serious about this. I say this joking sometimes silly to people and everything else, but I've always had utter most respect for Tommy as because most guys were just coming to the arenas and and doing their job and thinking about going into the ring and thinking about their master. Tommy has always thought broader than that, and I truly mean it, and I think that's what makes him special in the business is he looks at the total picture of the world of wrestling, you know, and that's when he walks into the arena. It's everything from the arena to the setup to the you know, he's just got a mind for the business and he's got you know, he's got a mind for it. But the most important thing that he has is the love for it, and he's got a love for the business, and I've always I think that's what's been the attaching thing. So this would be a connection that would have its its benefits for Tommy Dreamer because having Terry Funk as a as a sounding board for some ideas turned out to be a great thing, a great filter on some of the wild things sama Dreamer would come up with. And on a podcast used to have called House of Hardcore. Actually I don't know if he still has it or not. He's on the busted open stuff with a serious XM these days. He talked about an idea he pitched Paul Hyman during the time period that they're both talking about, when Terry Funk was in the locker room and someone you could consult and if you could read this for the Solar system boss, there was quite a wild idea that the Funker stood in the way of. I pitched this to Paul. I want to go out there in the ECW arena. We were famous for turning the lights off and turning the lights on and someone would be there. We were famous to turn the lights off, turn them on, you know, maybe putting them at half you know, just so did Terry Garvin, by the way, and someone would be there. So I wanted to go out there. And word had gotten out on what was going on in the talent raid. It's the era of wrestling dirt sheets, isn't it? Still has it? It? Always? You know, what's the the era of dirt sheets? Like I think what he means is it was the era when there really wasn't an Internet to counterbalance it. It was like the sheets were the only place to get this tantalizing glimpse of the behind I see, I see. So I come up with the idea where I'd stand in the middle of the ECW arena and I would address the situation. All of a sudden, the lights would go off and then come back on and nothing. I looked to my left, looked to my right, and nothing changes. Maybe it was a power surge. Then I'd begin talking and telling the tale of what went down. Then out of nowhere, I'd see a red dot on my shoulder, fucking go. Then I'd look and go huh and go ahead, boss, you're still there. Right, I'd get shot for real in the ECW arena And what would they chant if that happened to him e C dub e C dub e C dub I got from the show Dallas who shot j R? And the Simpsons who shot mister Burns. Well, you know, no, you really just got it from Dallas, because the Simpsons got it from Dallas, and both of those cases a person didn't actually, you know, get shot, So you didn't really get the right like it was a character getting shot. It wasn't like a human got the idea from you know, evil can eevil, or I got the idea from you know, Abe Lincoln h. You know, it's like, you know, I was like, you know what, Brian, I I got the idea from a John Grisham novel. I got it from watching you dad. I want to go back to ninety five. Let's go. Yes, actually that eighty five I remember watching it. That makes me sad. I thought, oh yeah, oh no, no no, no, I thought we could claim that who who taught you to do this stuff? You? All right? I am watching you parents who do drugs have children who do drugs? So wow, remember that. I remember that that one and the uh and the uh, the fucking the the skillet one with the egg. Oh yeah, your brain on drugs. This is your brain. Okay, one more time, this is your brain, This is your brain on drugs. Any questions? Yeah, when you say, O, brother, what do you mean by on dude? Are you who's on who? Exactly? Are you saying someone is on me dude on drugs? It's like when Clinton said it depends what the definition of is is is is? That's right in front? Is Jude? Wasn't she? The Bailey super fan ship? Okay? Uh? Tommy wanted a whole angle to play out where he comes back from being shot and feuds with all x ww B and w c W talent. Tommy goes on to say, what else, what else me for the idea to shot it? Paul said no, no, we cannot do. We cannot shoot you. And I said why? Paul said, what if we shoot a fan? That's awesome. I mean, I know that that's exactly how we meant to say it, but I fucking think it's hilarious an alternative. But what if we sure a fan instead? I didn't think of that, yes, uh, And I said, we'd hire a sniper. Okay, you want to get shot like a flesh wound? I get it. What if it hits a bone and shoots into the crowd and hits a fan. There's no way. There's no way you'll hit a fan. So me and Paul are debating back and forth. Paul turns and Terry funk he'sknock some sense into him. Well, it'll never work. Yeah, it's a horrible idea. When my father, when my father got shot in Amarilla, had killed our territory. The lapsed five. When my father got shot in Amarilla, it killed our territory. Yeah, my dad got shot with a twenty two on the air. We came back, the house was packed and it was great. We came back in a Texas death match. My father got shot for real in his buttocks. It's Texas and we shoot people. Here's the main thing. They didn't give a finish. If a man shoots you and you come back and you don't kill him, you expose wrestling is fake. Oh, this guy could have talked Oswald exactly. I'm i'm i am. I am just in awe at the mentality. Imagine that being proposed of these fucking idiots, Like, what is this world where fans are getting burned? Fans are getting burned, wrestlers are suggesting they get shot, and Terry funk talking about the reason it won't work is because it'll kill the territory. I mean, like not about not about hell, not about the fact that why do you want to shoot your get shot your dumb son of a bitch? I want ahead and got shot. I shot myself and you know what, it didn't draw a dime. Yeah, I wonder why is that one could find you? Is that what carry von Eric was thinking? I mean, come on, I'll tell you why. You know, back in Amarilla one time I went on TV and I shot myself on the temple and uh, you know, we came back the next week and yeah, the palace was packed, but everybody was real sad. Hadn't occurred to me that might happen, you know, it hadn't occurred to me that I died. Hadn't occurred to you that might happen, Terry, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know that's his Yeah sure, by the way, yeah yeah, uh no, I didn't know. And you know what, to this day, I don't know that I died. He shoot himself in the head with Dory next to him on the set and he hits the ground and Dorry just slicks at the camera, doesn't move, just waiting for his queue, his next queue to do something. Yeah, Terry's got the next line? Whose line is it? Anyway? What? I guess he ducked the line? Who who's ducking? Who's what? So did Terry? You got Terry? We're live, We're live, Bud. Hello, Hello, Terry's on the floor and Funk turns to his and walks off frame. Just look down once, Hello Terry. Hello, Ah, I guess we'll okay, and they go and they like they jump cut to an ad for like an Amerilla furniture store with Terry Funk of course spokesperson so Cactus Jack and Tommy Dreamer of feuding throughout nineteen ninety five and U c W where they is. If you don't buy furniture here, I'll kill myself. Well, Terry, I had to tell you, oh, and I hadn't did it and didn't buy the furniture and by the furniture, Dunk, So I had to I had to go ahead. I gotta go ahead and kill myself. Wow. Okay, that's one thing. That's what. That's one thing about Terry's family is they never had to wait for the go ahead. You know, they got it before they even do ask for it. They are they are Terry Funk and his brother are always always ready to go ahead. So Foley and Dreamer of feuding in ECW through ninety five and you know, beating each other senseless. And come the fall, it's November to Remember time, and Dreamer and Jack had a match against each other. Raven interferes attacks both until Terry Funk makes the same for Tommy and so at the November to Remember event in nineteen ninety five, Tommy Dreamer teams up with Terry Funk to wrestle Cactus and Raven. Now I don't recall if they sort of made it abundantly clear from the beginning of Terry Funk making the save that he was winding down his wrestling career and started saying that on the air. But by the time the match came around, it was well understood that this was supposed to be Terry Funk's last match in the United States. Now you snicker, I know Dutch Mantel put it well, he said, you know, Terry Funk had a second career in retiring, right, Yeah, the whole second career, just retiring and unretiring and then retiring, and this is one of those early examples of that. Of course, he retired in eighty three in Japan, but here he is back again, and it's hard. This one's hard to decipher because he comes back so quickly and no one really believes it, and his name is still very much in the mix when he's supposed to be retired, taking international dates with FMW and in Triple A in Mexico as well as a matter of fact, so this one wasn't really one that was taken very seriously except on ECW television. They did this loving video tribute to the song Desperado of all Terry Funk's great moments in slow motion over the years in ec W, from you know, putting the plastic bag on Paulheman's head to winning the title, to wrestling you know, all manner of opponents, from the public enemy to snook at a Foley and everybody else, and it was really touching thing and they really, you know, we're trying to signal to the audience that this is going to be a very special night because this will be Terry Funk's last last stand and to sort of pull at those uh, I guess you could say, to pull up those heartstrings. They put together a bit where a Funk and Dreamer sit next to each other backstage after Uh Tommy Dreamer had suffered suffered a beating, so he's got gig marks, he's got this apparatus on his head that's supposed to be uh you know, stemming the blood flow and keeping him bandaged up. And Terry Funk tells tells the story Tommy, I'm not gonna lie to you. I just, uh, I don't really feel like that I can. I think you're a great athlete. I think you're a wonderful person. I think you're a great kid. I think wonderful possibilities not wonderful, and I think that, uh, I'm very proud of you, and uh, it just comes a time that, uh, you know that I can't. Uh, I really don't feel that I could be a help to you. And I love the people up here at Philadelphia. I love them so much and and and they at eight and every one yards have been so good to me, and UH been wonderful. But there comes a time that you have to go ahead and go and uh it's about time for uh for me to go ahead and uh and get out of the business. Uh, my wife and by the time I went to her and uh to go around and when some places and did some things to be in that crazy wrestling business. And uh, I'm going to I'm my and and I, uh, you know, by choice, I'll never forget y'all. And I don't ever forget this kid over here. Uh. He tell a wonderful job, great kid. And I don't know. I've been around hard court people in a hard court fans, and I love him to death. And I don't know that this kid's kind of come up and I don't know how much influence I've had on him, but uh, I'm very proud of him at this time. And I wish I had the have, uh, the same olbility ability that I had a long time agoing, the same old desire that I had and everything. And uh, when he I was young, I was I pretty good. Tell me that us times pasted. Man, you need to go on down the road. Neither do And That's exactly what I'm going to do. And I'll tell you people out there, even though I'm going down the road, I may not see again in a wrestling ring, I'll see you again, because you're my friends. Like, I'll see Tommy right here. I don't care. I got enough bucks. I can fly up here and see Tommy. I'll get enough bucks. I can fly up here and see you. I don't have to be in a wrestling ring anymore. That's why tell you every time I wrestled on those fet what you did for me? Well, I was there, Tommy, That's all I got. So obviously trying to tug in the heartstrings, and what have we learned? When the functor starts to send signals that he's retiring, he sees some other money making opportunity that's going to pull him away from the business right nearby. Now, he didn't have a big movie role. The only thing I could find was a one line in the Observer that said that Funk was up for a Bruce Willis movie. Now he never did one. I mean, I'm pretty sure of that, right. No, he did not do one. We did anything with Bruce Willis. I don't know what the what the supposition was there, but yeah, the one line was Terry Funk will be filming a Bruce Willis flick in January, that is to say, January of nineteen ninety six. That did not happen. I don't know what that was supposed to be. I don't know if anybody's ever asked Harry Funk about that, but it definitely, you know, created the conditions that we've been accustomed to that lead Terry Funk to start saying, you know, maybe I'll just do this and just not come back, and knowing that, you know, if there's if there's paydays offered, he's coming back. But now he has a reason to turn promoters down. Right, I'm retired. I knew in this other project anyway, so i'd The only thing that that came even close to that is that ridiculous movie. Mom, Can I keep her? Tell me about that? Yeah, I played a clip of this in the thing. I remember that. He uh uh. It's a it's a TV movie and it's about a kid who who like he he he becomes friends with the gorilla and Terry is Terry Funk is the guy who is like, he's like the the circus guy. They his name is jungle Ed, you know. In the in the clip, he's like, he's got long, long hair and he he this sorts like a goofball and stuff with Bruce willis no nothing to do with Bruce. I'm saying. The closest thing is this. This is uh, this came out in ninety eight. Oh, closest thing in terms of timeline. In terms of timeline. The other than that, there's really there's nothing else. Yeah, I mean because the unless he did well, he did do the Beyond Belief Factor fiction episode that also came out in ninety eight. I'm sure that didn't take long to shoot. That's just like one episode of a series, right, that's yeah, right, right right, It's not the main thing. And the only thing he shot before then, or the most recent thing he shot before then was the episode of Thunder and Paradise, So I don't know what this well, there was something telling the front listen, there's very it's very possible that he could have it could have been happening and then get canceled the last minute. Absolutely you know that that always happens. Absolutely so. And he turned down a shot according to the Observer in the ninety six Rumble, remember how Dori was in that in Fresno. Kelvi, Yes, yes, he apparently turned down because he's he really reinvigorated his career in ninety four to ninety five in ECW, So it was in hiring him. You know, he was in WCW ninety four as a matter of fact, And I think the fact that Dory was in the Rumble tells you that there was interest again and getting the funks under the WWF banner. But he turns that down as well, and he works internationally just a little bit. He would point you would it would be written up that the November ninety five November to Remember Tag match in ECWB his final in America. And during the course of the match, they pull a shirt over Cactus's face and Dreamer punches the face and on the on the T shirt is an Uncle Eric face, Eric Bischoff's face. Oh my god, fully had a shirt on that said forgive me Uncle Eric. And they started punching the Bischoff visage over and over again. And then Funk teases the retirement speech afterwards without actually saying it so well, but they implied it very strongly in that go home promo that you the shirt that actually might have been you know, I think about it, I might I might be mistaken. That actually might be a postmatch interview right after if anybody remembers this interview. Please clarify because I don't have the chronology straight. That may have been him talking after this match in the locker room etommy as opposed to beforehand. I'm pretty sure that's what it was. Anyway. He also had a booking on December fifteenth of nineteen ninety five in Calgary. We've talked about the show before. This was the Stu Heart fiftieth anniversary celebration that they did and did pretty well, forty seven third, nine hundred paid, and you know, I think the Prime Minister came and all kinds of WWF guys came. They had Brett hard over Davey Boy. Remember we talked about how that was kind of like the precursion December ninety five in your House match Yep, yep, there's actually another run of that one. It was just like a big celebration, and you know, all kinds of guys got dispensation to appear, including Chris Benwan. He was under WCW contract at the time. You had a Razormon versus Own Heart on the show for the Intercontinental Championship. The Chris Benoir Rad Radford match. Ak Louis Pocoli was actually a WCW versus WWF contracted wrestlers match, which was incredibly rare basically never happened for sure. The one two three Kid did Keith Hart and a series of others there. But what kind of stole the show, according to the write up in The Observer, was Dori and Terry versus Bruce and Bruce and Keith Hart. So that was kind of framed up as perhaps the final match of his career in North America. I think there was a late minute change because the Observer talked about Keith Hart, but actually ended up being Brian Pillman and Bruce Hart who had histories and tag team together against Terry and Dorry. And that was again December fifteenth and nineteen ninety five, so that gets wrapped up. He also goes to Mexico and of all the territories and countries that Terry Funk rampaged through, and there are others we haven't even touched on yet that we're going to get too shortly here in the Lapsed Funk, Mexico really wasn't one that he cracked wide open. He never spent enough time down there. But this is during the time when when worlds Collide came out. This is when Triple A was having some success selling shows at the La Sports Arena and doing good houses in California. Yeah, and it was pretty clear the top two groups didn't really have a good strategy to appealed to the Latino audience, and these Luca groups were doing incredibly well south of the border and trying to tease their way up. And you know, this is where Conan consolidates his power and becomes like the agent for all the luchadors that came to RECW and then WCW. So this is all happening, and Jake Roberts famously got a call from Triple A and headlined a hugely successful match where he wrestled against Perroguyo and I think Conan and a triple threat that did an incredible gait in an American wrestling arena which blew a lot of people's minds, and Meltzer's talked about this. That slot that went to Jake Roberts was originally had Terry Funk in mind, but apparently Funk was winding down his wrestling interest at around the same time. Yeah, October twenty first, at the Chicago International Amphitheater. They did a show, Triple A did a show, and according to the observer of the highlight was Terry Funk nearly starting a riot, turning heel on Conan and Peroguayo after a main event with Conan and Aguayo and Octagon versus Cien Caras and Killer and KGB. Now this is this is a Triple A show in Chicago, So it's not like Funk is going down to Mexico and doing much in their rings, but certainly it was a step in that direction. It didn't go much further, but again, always there's always the carved outs. You know, he's still working. He's still working Canada, that's right, still lining up shots in Mexico. He's still working for FMW in Japan, which had launched by this point, which we'll get to. And uh, you always have to watch very closely for those My last match in Amarilla, remember he started saying that about the match in This is gonna be my last match for this month. This is my last match until my next one. And I just want to thank everybody. It's been an incredible life, it's been an incredible career, and you supported me all the way. And i'd like I'd like to see you tomorrow night at the Cotton Bowl. I'm gonna wrestle again. Thank you. This is my last night forever of this month of this year. That's right. I'm pretty sure it was on that Chicago show. I think Cactus was there because he's he's told a story and we might have been had it in the bank here coming up about how he gets awarded Like some he gets some kind of award and he thanks over all the people for it. He goes, you know, just it's such an honor. It's, of course not as much of an honor as it would be if it was given to me by an American wrestling outfit. Oh my god. Yeah, fucking want to kill him. You know, that's one thing you would always. He would shit on the country he was in, if he was if he was abroad trying to get heat. He did it in Germany, he did it in Puerto Rico, and it's fucking amazing every time the guy knows how to. I mean, that's the kind of heat they were afraid of him getting. Remember against the Perto Ricans and Madison Square Garden. He was talking about that as to why Vince Senior didn't really book him that much after a couple of shots. There was in part that they were just going to go out there and do again as much heat as they possibly could, even if they were told not to, even if there was a sensitivity about getting shut down in New York due to riots, which had happened before and was a very real concern. He was going to fucking do whatever he wanted to do. So Funk stays busy through the end of ninety five with this retirement stipulation hanging in the air, this idea that he's not going to wrestle again in America, and he disappears for quite a while, and he doesn't resurface in ECW until the next November To Remember November sixteenth, nineteen ninety six. Shane Douglas in Primetime Brian Lee aka Chains in the Discipation of the Concalympse, one of your favorite wrestler's boss always a running a rampant through ACW and Tommy Dreamers on the other side of their rampage, and he finds himself in a position that he needs a tag team partner from the November to Remember and you better believe Terry Funk returns to the Fray for our next match. Here on the Lapline Count and pull up disc twenty eight Boss twenty twenty eight of the Terry Funk Tribute Terry Terry Funky, Terry Funky thirty seven, thirty five thirties they have them thirty Okay, excellence, So again this is the November to remember in nineteen ninety six, Terry Funk returning to ECW And what do they always say? You know, how can we miss you if you never go away? Yeah? And you know, a guy's second world title is always the one where you can tell if the people really accept him as a champion. Yeah, it's like that whole albatross of you know, having to appear to be worthy of the title. That image has already been processed in the fan's mind, so they're not trying to get over that hump. And I think in a lot of ways, this disappearance in return for Terry Funk really did it for him. It was like the perfect capstone of like, no, this is this is actually how much these fans love this guy because when they see him again, they realize how much they've missed him, and he's been a pretty consistent presence throughout the entirety of ECW's existence, and they loved him for that. But I think this year long absence here between ninety five and ninety six November to remember, I think provokes a response where you're just like, yeah, we absolutely have to put this guy over in the main event of our first pay per view. This is like, this is the time to strike. It's kind of like when remember Lawler got over so much that year that they were like, put him over the miss or when Sammy's Ain got over so much last year, it was like put him over Rumman Rains do it yep, yep, Nope, because you had the show, the Montreal Show on the docket. It was just do perfect things. This was kind of Terry Funk's version of that. So let's hit play in three two one play of our double main event Green Partner Tag Team at jo As was the case kibook first and You'll never joy that. It was originally scheduled to be Tommy Drimer and against the franchise Shane Douglas and the Bulldozer. Brian the Dozer have a franchise injured pidfall two the first time in his career in middle Chance, Tommy Dreamer had one man left to call the legend and yep they won it. Fifty three year old Terry fifty three Johnson, welcome back and smile the fuckers fans. Yeah, I'll tell you it feels great to have Terry Funk back in the e c W O rita is that Joey Styles doesn't sound like him? Then the time I'm introduce slowly Franky? What a witch? Why so cruel? Who? Why are they so cruel? The Francie pounds the crowns at s World call it a champion. The franchise sh man who broke the neck of Garry Wolf hit Bull number one? Ada wait a three hundred and seventeen pounds point time, p fucking second Queen que the ship He's going to get hear me? HiT's so pride tie Bryan Lee? Why hid him to take out the legend? It is a bulldozer bride, Brian Lee the same corecon the bulldozer ry. Some said bullshitter? What guys saying bullshitter? From Yonkers dangerous man to hud and sixty four Browns Hoy Rhodesia a legend when in and fifty one pounds from the dog pro frience. Hell p, the funker is back. So there's a response. Yeah, I mean it's pretty incredible, and said the play along fans in the front row, Like the straw hat guy he is screaming fuck you at Shane Douglass. Oh yeah, well he called uh he insid you know, he called them what a bulldozer, Brian idiot? The guy this and the straw hats said bullshitter Brian what he said? Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's pretty glowsome. Yeah, fuck him up, Terry, fuck him up as the chat. I bet this makes a quick tag two chains. Oh god, what a weird looking douchebag. Yeah, John Jacks, I'm gonna go ahead and and and kick you and the balls looks the way she's a whole towards Ferian City. Absolutely France scene was so what's the problem with that? He was just tar of the heels Valet it's fun to chant alner sure this chant where's my pizza? When the full blooded Italians would come out big right hand by Brian Lee working over the The Innovator of Violence, Tommy Dreamer and his ec fn W T shirt. I had one of those. I have a shame to say. I am ashamed to say. You should be ashamed to say. Sh saide Russian leg sweet By dream Waters, the damnedest thing all of a sudden, the CWT shirts. But you had to odor online in the arena. We're in a regular like department store. I don't know what deal they reached. Oh the Funker, Shamee Douglas try to slip into blindside Tommy Dreamer. Funker tackled him. We're going ahead and brawl on a ring side. Oh, we're gonna go ahead and brawl on the crowd. Go ahead, and Jews, can't your sense of all the Terry Funk ECW matches we've watched so far, there's like a heightened like excitement about him right here. Yeah, I mean, I think, I mean, I also think any you know, any comeback is is an exciting moment for her life. I'm not trying to take anything away from them, I understand from from Terry Funk, but it's giving chase Francine kind of. She's passing him a bit, and he's chasing her across the ring and right back. I think he has her by the hair. She uh, which hair right pubic hair before you can do anything about it. Change Douglas blindsided the Funker with a steel chair across the bad She was she known? Did she do everybody? No, No, she was. She was not like that at all. From really that's great. I like that she's she's Uh, she's a really ud appreciated asset that ECW had. She made everybody she she worked with. She was huge, like pin up girl for ECW that came out Walkin's a hot selling and the merchandies amazing. Yeah, she was like sable almost honestly in terms of how she fit. Very cool herefore ball when I hadn't had all guys in the ring, when I hadn't butted with my head and what I hadn't you know, I just when I had and went home, chair upside the head of Dreamer expose over the guard rail. She's a freaking idiot, Tommy Dreamer francying on the move with no shoes on. Yeah, he's a fan clutching a frying pant. But you know by the looks of him, it isn't because it's bringing your own weapons night either. I'll tell you what. I'll tell you what though, Uh, Tommy Dreamer isn't the innovator of my patience, that's the true, Yeah, the innovator of somehow cooking taking cereal with butter. Yeah, you know, I prefer to have my cereal with melted butter instead of milk. Speaking of which, the Funker taking right hands from Douglas and screaming at him, looking at me, going a haryout and he feels real good about his physique. D you cantull lys flexing? No? Yeah, actually in a while, massive left. It's the funker loads up Douglas amidst the the rabbit ecw faithful here at the arena. They had not yet announced Bardly Legal that came in January. I believe wow that you know where? What is? This is ninety six, that's right. Yeah, I want you to consider, you know, Sid beating Sean Michaels in the garden. Yep, yep, yep. Up Here we go to the arena, fucking leather, all these leather jackets and ship it gives you a goo a decade through the front door into a gara. We're outside right now, fans screaming, trying to get their mugs on the camera. Yeah, No, one's gonna see it. Do you realize that a whole video? Yeah, I guess the same way. Any of these people saw shows they want to, but that wasn't their primary motivation. That's the difference between now today m HM and you show up hoping to have their moment. They showed up to watch the matches and then if it happened, it happened. They didn't come there expecting it as part of the experience. Kind of though. It was like the first baby step in that direction, because you did go to c W shows to chant your chance, you know, you did go to ECW shows to to say smart mark things right. In Unison, our Funk working over Brian Lee with a head butt on the far side of the winding wall, Dreamer draws brawls with Channing Douglas back all of a sudden and well remembering dream Agains's wish in a similar vein those lights were to go off and did go off when Cactus hit Funk with the flaming chair, because when they came back on, Terry Funk was going to be a part of me. Tommy Dreamer was going to be crucified in the ECW arena. So he's just going to all kinds of dark places. Then Tommy Dreamer and the legendary Funk. So how does he innovate violence? Exactly? What's his? Who would just like do different things with chairs? I guess, I mean, but anybody does that? Dude, Terry. Here here comes Funk and Dreamer loading the steel guard rail and Christ you know, Shane Douglass with that hair looking like fucking Billy Gun from ninety six nailed again. Douglas takes a plastic chair, shot to the head and collapses onto the rail that's going to load it over the rail. Oh Jesus Christ, ohmy bunker's got the chair go a head head and went ahead and got a chair. Well think about those plastic chairs they do like a pop ha said, fuck it with the chair. Oh Jesus Christ. Rail loaded up in the corner and Douglas thrown into it, takes it. You know, I wish I do, wish we could Brett Hart and c W I'd love to see him. Fascinating. Imagine I'm did he comment on this ship in his book? Not really, No, I would imagine this is like this is like fucking snuffed him. Yeah, Well, there's people of respects in eac W, so he'd probably be careful about what he said. Oh no, Brian Lee's on the canvas. They dropped the guardrail in his face and then they body slam Shane Douglas on top of the rail while it's still on top of Brian Lee. This is e C. Dub but he's he you know, but ahead and dropped the left between the eyes of prime time A fucking franchise. That was half of his interviews back the fucking fuck fuck. He'd say fuck as much as he could. No one else was doing so it work. But yeah, he broached on that rail that's in the ring and the Dreamer clothes lines shading Douglass off of it, bringing the violence here Tommy Dreamer and Terry Funk November to remember this is a hot tape. I remember this. I shot a lot of angles that would get you hyped for badly legal before you knew it was coming. Wow, what the fuck is he doing? You were standing on the rail inside the ring. Jesus Christ. He jumps and lands on his crotch on the rail line. It's like when Jerry Lawler did the surprise running later in January, when the lights went out and the craped Dreamer so hard the nuts that he like legitimately needed to go on a doctor. It's him in his crutch. D d T by Terry Funk on Brian like I I pictured Tommy Dreamer. You know he's he's got to be a gym teacher somewhere, not now is he is a cow? He's like three. Listen, listen. You don't have to be in shape to be a gym teacher. It's true. Most gym teachers I ever had were not in shame. He works at impact. He's got like a nanagerial. He's isn't it again it's tea I should have said that it's TNA again. That's right after we did the ever noticed that that how that times to go. No, I'm with you. Don't mistake people being interested in us covering something with a renaissance and interest in the subject matter. By the way, yeah, okay, there's much different fixed with giving people. It's not just nostalgia. Big Suplex by Douglas drops Tommy Dreamer on top of that guardrail which is just proven to be a mischievous element and that ring. As Funker hits the floor with Brian Lane did Bobby Heenen talking to me. By the way, Oh that Bobby heen would have thought of e W. I'm sure, oh man, he must have thought it was perverse. Sorry. Funk absolutely launches Legant of the crowd as Douglas keeps the punishment on dream and drops it me first on that l like a shinbuster, fucking franchise, fucking Shane Douglas with a huge grand from the mid nineties. I'd say, a Dutch boy, are kind of does you g Michaels two thousand and two, idiot looking like you? Grant, no one's ever said that before. He had that kind of like that, that that hair back in the like mid nineties movies that he did. It's terribly unfortunate. It is extremely unfortunate. Punk now on his knees getting punched in the head by Brian Lee and the crowd of the Funker and Dreamer. Oll a pardon me. While Douglas in the Dama exchange blows Tommy firing back out of the corner. Franccene springs in action when she sees that hits the middle rope. What's she gonna do? He's not a wrestler, but she's got a cross body in her and it drops streamer because you get the bad wheel. I se little feed of athleticism there from Franccene. I don't recall her going to that length. I mean she took bumps, but didn't fly covered by Douglas kits too. She bumped bumps. That was a big thing. Innisa w was like you pile drove Francene and you pulled her throng up her ass before you did it, sort of inconsider and the dumped on her head. That was Look how close to how many people they stacked in the building. Look how close that rail is to the apron? Why do my people get burned? Right? Yeah? That this now drops Tommy me first under chair of folding out steel chair. I got steel, it's all the plastic. How are you doing over here? Oh my god, that is the haircut he had give me the Hugh Grant, You fucking piece of shit. I want to look like Hugh Grant. Let me introduce you into this lovely lady of the evening. It's opposed to Lu Grant, Lou Lou Grant. Oh god, you Grant, the son of Lou Grant. Bunk are worse for wear as. We just got a shot of Brian Lee standing on his throat on the in the concrete. It's Tommy Dreamer punches Douglass and the nuts and that brings Francine right back in. She's gonna try to climb the ropes. Dreamer cuts her off this time, holds her up pine in the back suplex atomic drop and Francie eats the top buckling. Wow. Was there any connection between the idea that he was the franchise and her name was fran Scene. That's actually a good question. I think that's a real that is a real name, So I don't think so. But she was supposed to be like the cheerleader that's with the jock high school quarterback. I was kind of like her thing was like if you ever lose the title, I'm gonna leave you. Ah, that kind of like, you know, strict gold digger, but like low end gold digger, you know. Yeah, Irish Wiper to think boot Brian Lee now getting in taking the fight to Tommy Drener. It's the funk. Are still see him wandering the landscape. Chairs, Here we go, Here we go, Bunker's in the arena. Chairs are flying brother Dreamer dodges a boot you know from Brian Lee, which connects with the face of Douglas Terry Funk meanwhile were entering the fray. I think it may be bleeding. Yeah, I saw some juice slapping the ship out of Shane in the corner, the barking on ahead and threw a laugh. You know he's actually uh, he's actually uh uh mimicking Vince there hitting Shane in the corner. Might up Larry it from Funk drops Douglas cover two not enough, Oh no, Bridley just chokes lamb We're out of the ring through a table on the floor, and of course the crack ECW production truck right on it. Totally missed it. Heard the noise. I mean, it's all like what fucking Paul Hayman's like high school friends and ship kind of Brian Lee should have come in and been the taker under less, they should have done. Funk right to the floor to check on Dreamer, telling the ref where you Dreamers. They're very much the worst for wear. Of course, looks like he's gonna stop the match, and Funker grabs the refs as hell. No drags out John Finner ain't gonna hit him. Because it doesn't affect anything as Finner getting into the crowd. Wow, Terry Funk thorn refs into the crowd. Look at his face, all bloody. He's break in front row there or terror rising? How comes to Funker with his wild lass taken on both Douglas Anela. You didn't give a fuck. Look at these wild punches. He's just like connecting with you. Listen to people. Jesus, his hair is absolutely offensive at this stage. What was that? His hair is absolutely offensive at this stage? Hey, Terry's yeah, yeah, it's it's hanging on your motherfucker? What are you? Oh? Your piece of shit? I'm gonna go ahead and slap the taste out of your eym. Look at them wind mill and punches. Holy shit, It's like at the Barn and Marilla. I'm gonna have myself a home school brawl. Douglas is a history teacher. Wouldn't like that big pile driver by the franchise spikes Funker into the canvas? What a wild See the chaos that Terry Funk was able to create just for a moment down the match. Yeah, just by throwing like windmill disoriented, I don't care what I hit punches, swinging it, swinging at ghosts, and he was just like uniquely good at that. He was There's no question about that works just as well in ECW as it did any other company he worked in. Spike piled by Douglas and Lee. Now in the Funker, sign of Dreamer, who's still on a heap of table. I mean, that's sound a surprise. He's always at a heap of table. Even got a gul and it's a Yonkers book, pitzs, pitzas and stuff, pitses. I'm trying to say pizzeria, and so you said pits. This sounds like a the college. Shane Douglas tried to get into tell the story that they're trying to break Terry Funk's neck. Brian Lee just did the Zeus neck break thing back in the day. I wonder where that originates from. Zeus was the first person I saw doing and no holds barred. Yeah, you just grabbed the neck and twist it away. It breaks. No one does that lest thing anymore. No, I mean, well, because I think people actually know how you break next. Now I feel like movies have done that a lot better, so it's like you don't really funk was hung was halfway hanging out of the ring. They grabbed them and dragged him by his ancles like a dog and snapped his neck again. It's almost like Terry was looking for a way out. I mean, the only one I've ever seen anyway, But kind of make that believable? Is Hogan, believe it or not? Interesting? Hogan taking that was a big It looked good, like I didn't think these looked good drag outside. Is that Joey styles uncommon? Arry, Yes, it is. It doesn't sound like them at all. His voice changed a lot over the years. So now another takes out there on the apron, and they're gonna pile drive funker O Jesus, shades of Rick Flair. Gotta be shipping me on that Rick Flair nine eighty nine. Look at that accept now, Funks can't taking its standing on over there? You se Quentin Tarantino over there? You see him right there, he's Quent that is standing on the table. Though Douglas jumped off the apron something through something in the fans throwing ship Terry fucking c W security, Like, what happened? What the fuck? Through that? Which one to use? I'm gonna kick you out. You fucking come clean, and I'm gonna kick you out. Which one I use through that right, I'm not gonna tell you. Then, God, listen to Ring flipping off all the fans, A hillacious pile driver and the Funker threw a table on the floor. Dreamers back in and he's throwing He's throwing one last spurt from the innovator of violence. M h. He's takes over Douglas high hammers him on the canvas. Brian Lee diving on Dreamer. Just a brawl, just a battle, just punches. Yeah, Tommy, choke. I think the Funker's dead. Boss. Uh oh, he is actually breaking the news. He's got a tombstone a channel fake Undertaker, Yes he is. Oh he does. And he's so bad at that. That is so dangerous looking. What's his hands like? Undertaker in the chest of Dreamer Afi he had been thrown to the front row by Terry Funk don't forget his loaded back and gets to and no, Dreamer lifts the shoulder. My god, she's a ringside. She doesn't have any clues on franchise, says we're gonna make a choke from about this. Here comes Francine again talking ship this little backstabbing Hussey stabbing Hussey and here comes Bulah, Tommy Dreamer's wife boo cookie sheet to Francine's head at These two had great cat fights. Where's the Johny Styles cat fight? Call? Oh my god, Brian Lee grabs Bulah by the hair the head buttzer Oh jesus. Now the crowd was totally desensitized by this point to male wrestlers attacking female vallets. It was actually quite something. York Jula came in wearing a neck brace from her prior angle and it just got ripped off by the franchise. Is that a real name? But Ula? She was in penthouse once. Really, Pink Belly and Bellies are ship Belly franchise with his Finnish armed doubtstuffing started. They know it's his turn do something about this injustice new cowboy in town. Bull were making Tommy watch, Yes, making Tommy Dreamer watch as they abuse his wife. Still haven't seen Funk since studless pile drove him through a table. Yeah, the Bullos were Tommy Dreamer back out in the crowd. Here comes damaged Control from attendant damage control. Yeah, it comes dual It comes Bailey. Here's imagine this sky. Oh god, that's gonna be possible with Ai every soon. Oh yeah, have like Luthez running during the bronheartshat Michael's match. I mean, can you imagine that would be spectacular? Shane with a corn planchet shop. You nod into the audience onto Funk and we can't see it that well from the herd camera side, but we see a chair going up and down from Brian Lee into the the carcass of Tommy Dreamer. Terry Funk has re emerged, and now they get the camera in the crowd. Oh my god, they're in the crowd and funks climbing, funks climbing. They don't see him. He whale, moon salt. He will do it for god knows what reason. Here we go, Oh my god, he's land on his head. There's just something. Look at these people. What do you see? I see, I see longness. I just don't ye Terry. I mean he took key rested all right there. I'm afraid time turn the mold over. Fifty three year old Terry Fuck. That's why he's a living legend, and the legend grown stronger every day, got that boss. That is why he's a living legend. Tommy dream Back, it looks like he hit his head in the concrete by the way he hits his head on the floor like eighty percent of the time. He's moved salty out of the way. I know, I know, mm. Nobody knows how to catch a torpedo and old man like that. Back in the ring and Funk with a home run swing to the knee of Brian Lee with a steel chair. Brian Lee was lining up. I think a choke slam on Tommy Dreamer. Here comes Shane Douglas from behind, spins around the funker. That fucker cracks him in the knee as well. Terry Funk knew how to attack I set of knees with a steel chair. I'll tell you that crack him several times. It's a perfect set up. Here we go even in E c W. He's gonna do that lame ass fucking spitting toe hold spitty. That's such a stupid move, Brian Lee maankes the sage before Douglas forced to consume a pile driver would be better than that ship the Brady Funk a steel care and a spinning the franchise is in pain thanks to Terry Funk and Terry Funk is in pain thanks to Terry Funk. It up Funk a weak need wide base like you can barely stand grab by the gullet by laying. Oh my god, can pop in? What camera? A TV camera? Tommy Dreamers cracks Brian Lee the cameras he's about to kill funk Funk. Did he choose Brian Ley? Come on, co wa po two minutes you're waiting. Tommy Dreamy has been to the living legend. Get the new at the board. No'll november to remember. That's the failing sentiment, Terry. He gets up and put the camera in his hands and fl is it out of the ring, collapsing in a failed attempt to stand up. What a mat job. The bulldoz are nailed to the sign of the head of the television camera. Try Tommy Dreamer is the innovator of violence, friend choice, Try to stand up, Terry padt On Fock Shade attacks you see Don d details fucker ho bulldos referee John fitting against Tick chokes Lahm Rocks to would you They're gonna destroy Tommy Creemer and Terry Fum. They don't care about losing the mat job. They want to break decks, they want to breaks, they want to They just want to destroy Tommy Dreamer and Terry who's that there? Got the head ball, the boll number two, garyus t Anthony Granny, who Hipple number two who Shane Duga said legitimately broken his neck in the ring and he came back healed for the first time on this show. I'll slam the ship out of here. And people care about this gal, Yeah, all they cared about the The angle is really hot because he came in with the neck brace. We have the bars in your head and Shade Brackham by those where he legitimately had broken they can throw him about the house. Tending to carry Funk now les from number two. You know as well that they saved the big return it you're at the arena and uh, what's that Terry Funk getting his moment back before the e c W Faithful, So he's on his way to winning his championship again, the World Championship. Remember he had won the ECW title for the first time back in October of nineteen ninety three, defeating Saboo, and then lost it to Shane Douglas, which was you know, part of the prelude to the three Way Dance and the heat that heisted and the storytelling there between Shane Douglas and Terry Funk, and we move in two funks, next and last attempt to claim that crown. It's Barely Legal and again available in the archives, available in a way where we hadn't quite you know, mastered the format yet. So there's true, there's not really a ton. There's some of background, like we did get into how brilliantly Barry Bloustein documented this thing. I mean, beyond the mat. When you think of Barely Legal, I don't even think of the show. I think of the documentary when I think of the right, you know what I mean, what was your takeaway having seen those scenes quite recently for the Funk Journey of le of Very Legal. I mean, I've never gone back and watched it, so I'd have to watch it again. I really, what impression about the significance of the show just beyond the mat leave you with? Like? What are your lasting memories of that part of the dock? And if there's nothing, nothing really it doesn't It didn't really do anything for me. It's interesting here as we go back to that R video sit down shoot interview that they did with both Tommy Dreamers and Terry Funk, and uh, they kind of queue up just what I queued up, and Terry Funk gives an answer surprisingly much closer to what you said right there. Here we go for the two of you went on you see'll be first bet on pay per view. How big of a deal was that? It wasn't you know it was It wasn't any big magnificent thing to me or anything. He was you in the main event, and yeah, it was a huge thing. Oh it's interesting to me because again there was a national platform. It was something we had to do. I remember being kind of like disappointed that I did not wrestle on the show. But Paul I sat me down. Is like, you're giving up your main event title shot on the first pay per view to your mentor, Terry Funk. And it's what a great story of Tommy Dreamer, the guy, the martyr, Tommy Dreamer, the guy who's giving back to ECW. And I mean I remember that. I mean again the pay per view. There was a lot of bad parts of that, but the emotion and the stuff leading into like Terry going to his dad's grave and cutting promos and then you know Terry Funk doing the I don't know if I'm going to be able to do this. You know, Terry Funk carrying the load of the pay per view and then Terry Funk delivering at the end and going off in the fans. You know, his wife was there, his kids were there, He's all bloody, and uh. That was where we at least we at least got to pay per view because in the ECW was always the next step. So it was it was very much about Terry Funk carrying the load. I mean people bought that pay per view to see what it was like. That was the draw of Barely Legal. Second to that would be the Taz Saboo match. That was the hottest match on the show. The Terry Funk thing was very well told and his Dreamer reference there, and we'll get into it. There was some pretty great promo work done on ECW television in the weeks leading up to the show, building up Terry Funk as somebody you really cared about winning the championship. It really wasn't a storyline that had all this ECW edge to it. It was like another example of how, yeah, if they needed to reach into the traditional playbook, no one was better in the country than ECW pulling off an old school wrestling angle with old school wrestlers in a lot of cases, or new wrestlers that had old school mentalities, right, But that just you know, wasn't really what kept the turnstiles turning, so they had to lean much more into stuff that was much more violent and insane and crazy and buzzworthy. But when it came time to build up Barely Legal and the story, Tommy Dreamer talked about passing the championship opportunity on to Funk, it was it was time to get down to business and really tell a traditional wrestling story. And they did just that, but not before they all you know, sort of tipped their collective cap to the Funker. The night before Barely Legal in Philadelphia at Hotel Ballroom, they had a full banquet to honor Terry Funk as part of the weekend festivities. This is something that our video put out there as a DVD release, and it's remarkable. You might remember some of these scenes. There's not much, but there's like one or two scenes and beyond the mat where Funk is into tuxedo and he's talking to a ballroom full of people. I don't know if you remember that at all, Yes, yes I do. I do. It was wonder Burn and know this is gonna be my last year in wrestling. It's when he makes that comment. But you know, Barry's last week was there in attendance, and we'll even hear a snippet of the remarks that he made to the assemble DCW wrestlers. But it was pretty interesting. Fans were in, fans were invited, you buy a ticket. There was you know, white tablecloth kind of thing going on, and you had the full Dais and you had wrestlers up there totally out of character. You had Taz there with his wife. You know, if Paul Hayman pointed that out as a big thing when you consider Taz his character as like the ultimate Loan or an ec W, the last thing that Taz as a character would want is to show up in front of the fans with his wife and make people think that he's actually a soft purse. Yep. But when it came time to aunitory, Funk, you went back into your you know, show your proper respect mode and you put your you know he Paul Haman talked about how a lot of talent that he knew damn well didn't known a suit bought their first suit to be able to go to this banquet to honor Terry Funk. So it's not just like they thought about this as a big night for Terry Funk and a big night to salute Terry Funk after the fact, or it became clear when the show was over that he was the one that pulled the heartstrings the most. They knew ahead of time, such that they even set up a banquet, and I can't imagine the anxieties coursing through that room knowing that they're going to go live for the first time in their existence the next night in pay per view and an all or nothing gamble, and if it doesn't go well, the company's pretty much done. But they took the time, nonetheless to honor the Funker. And so we're going to share a series of eclipse that I think really well encapsulate where Terry Funk stood in the minds and hearts of people in ECW and really the wrestling world rip large before he won the championship at Barely Legal. First up is Joey Styles, and I was asked to say a few words about Terry Pump. It made me uncomfortable because who am I. I'm publishing twenty five years old. I've been in this business only four years. I'm still wet behind the ears and I've got a long way to go. But I I can you know, I grew up watching Terry on TV. I always loved him, and when I first started here at ECW, you weren't even extreme back then. Terry had one East W World television title from Jimmy snuck in a cage and Paulie said, you're gonna connecting Terry. Not too much shakes me up. I don't get nervous about too many things. I was very nervous, and I mean up until tomorrow night. That's been the highlight of anything I've done wrestling is that first interview with Terry Punk. And then a few weeks later I interviewed Terry again. He tried to kill me on television, string around my neck and made me soil myself. I suppose above them he's gonna be initiated into this business by anybody. Terry Punk. I get very emotional watching Terry wrestling. He's fifty three years old. It does, I say moon salts on the concrete, I'm a boss. I don't really. He doesn't need to wrestle anymore. I'm sure he doesn't need to wrestle the way he does. And whether there's three different people in the building or eleven hundred, two thousand or ten thousand, when you see Terry Funk's name of McCarty, you know you're going to see somebody work as hard as he can and when no one else can. And it's that reason that I get choked up when I watched Terry wrestle, and I'm sure I'm going to be very emotional when we're live tomorrow night seeing Terry the three way in nice remarks there from Joey Styles and that that's fine, that's the that's the thing. He doesn't have to wrestle. It's not that he doesn't have to wrestle, he doesn't have to wrestle the way he does. Just mer Funk tries to kill Joey Styles. We're going to play the tape of the moment from the very earliest days of ECW that Joey Styles was talking about where he's conducting an interview with the Funker. So let me load it up on my side and we'll all right, no hold on where you play? Yeah, stop redoing that? There we go. Any thoughts while I'm loading this up on that bit of sound from the banquet, Uh No, it's all you know. I I I can't help but just take all this ecy w shit with like a little grain of salt. I just there's something about it that just I know, I'm I'm so anti with all this ship and I know people are all and I and again, I just like there's there's I have No It's hard. It's very hard for me. It's a very hard thing for me to really grasp. I don't know why. Well, here's something that's entertaining in any generation. This is Terry Funk giving Joey Styles a hard time. We've seen him give our times to so many announcers over the course of the last Funk This would be no exception. So we'll hit play in three, two, one a lot. Let me eat in. I'm here with the former Eastern Jemmy Wrestling television champion Terry Funk Joey Styles. I want to say a couple of things to you people out there, and you yourself, Do you realize that I have never been afraid of anything in my life? I have no fear of Believe me. I have danced with the grim Reaper before. I have smelled death in the air before. And let me tell you something else. My father, God bless him, he died in my arms. So I know what fear and death is. And I am not afraid of any man. So Polly Dangerously brings the person like taboo into the ring, He brings him before me. And what does he think I'm gonna do? Does he think I'm gonna get down on my knees and shudder and shake? Oh? No, I'm not because I am not afraid of that man. I am not afraid of the Hawk. I am not afraid of King Kong Bundy. I am certainly not afraid of Now, Joey Styles, you are about the same size as Polly Dangerously, Am I right or not? Don't even go ahead and give me into that book the way you're caught unto me Right now, I'm saying you're about that little right, yes, sir, And he's not supposed to be afraid of anything. Well, let me ask you one thing. Come here by the jacket. Yes, he would be afraid if I grabbed him by the collar, grabbed you? You sure he would be afraid? Lying to me? Shut up? Wow, Now let me tell you something else. You don't think he would be afraid with that? Do you? But what if I took the same string that I am putting around your neck right now, your little and tucking around his neck, and oh my god, that he would be ship Do you think? Do you think that you would be afraid of that? Do you? Why? You? Damn well? All right, he would really holy for his light, for his damn life. That what you would be afraid of. And that's what you should be upraid of. And that's what Samboo should be up right of. Tooo, because I am that's tough, that holy shit. Obay you damn right, I am. I'll get out of here, you puke faced Jesus Christ promo for you. That's incredible. So yeah, I can say where that would come to mind when Joey Stayles took the Dais to think about Terry Funk, Yeah, for sure. Holy four hours from the Oh my God. The next up was Chris Candido, who very much pattered himself after Terry Funk and in factice we've talked about it. Did what's that he did? Oh? Yeah, yeah? He he grew up a huge fan of Terry Funk and was a student of the game. Who would, you know, go out of a way to tape trade and get his hands on footage. So he he actually saw Terry do his thing, saw him in Smoking Mountain, put on the same trunks. Remember, were talked about how unique Terry Funk. Yeah, and he actually wore them in a feud and a couple of matches against Terry Funk and E. C. W. And and what's you know what's sad about this is so many of the people that stand up and not so many, but a noticeable amount of people who stand up or are mentioned or a referenced in this Terry Funk banquet the night before barely legal pass away before Terry Funk does. And you know, it's like he's seating this generation that will carry the business on after he after he's gone. No, he's not. And and and they all die before he does. That's right, including Chris Candido who was there with Sonny at the time. So here we go. I think just like every other wrestler that wrestle's here in the e c W. We all had the opportunity to watch Terry Funk when we were little kids, and uh, I always thought that nobody could beat up polpe Covid until I saw Terry Funk meet up poulpe Covid. So then when I decided to become a pro wrestler and I was getting trained, I got a chance to go to a show and somewhere in California, and I saw Terry Funk fight Chavo Guerrero beat the living hell out of him, And just like most of the guys in ECW, I was scared of him. I was scared to meet him, and just like most of the other guys in ECW, once I got a chance to talk to him and see what he was all about, he was the nicest guy in the world. But other than that, I've realized something. In the ECW, you have to give one hundred and ten percent, and most of us are pretty young guys, but Terry Funk at fifty three years old, it doesn't go into the ring like a lot of older wrestlers doing just to collect the paycheck, walk in lock up, get pinned, get out. He gives one hundred and ten percent. And you know, back a few year years ago, when guys like Sam Woo and guys like the Eliminators started doing moves like moon salts, Terry Funk rely on what he had already had previously known to him in his repertoire. But he incorporated things like moon salts over the barricades onto the concrete. And that's just a testament to what kind of an athlete Terry Funk is. And I personally feel honored to get to be in the same sport and to get a chance to come up here in front of all of you and say to Terry Funk, thanks for your work ethic, and thank you that you wrestle here to CW because God knows you might be able to make a lot more well not Mike, You would be able to make a hell of a lot more money somewhere else doing a lot less, and instead you choose to stay here in ECW. Thank you very much, Terry for both. I was so sure I never imagined that I'd be in the same locker room with this man. I mean, I used to read a parad dice alley like five different times in a wow. But like I said, I first time I met him, didn't even know what to say to you. I didn't even I couldn't even talk. I was in shock. But uh, it's a privilege and an honor to be here, be it with eac Dog. I consider in my family all you guys. I love all you guys, everybody, and I especially love this man because, uh, it wasn't for him, I probably wouldn't be here now, and I probably would have gave up. But after seeing what he does, his age and he's great man, I can't say nothing nothing about it. I love you. I think that. Got a phone call from Paul and come up to eas W to do something. Alis that's good to the superstar in Atlanta, New York, Japan, I said, who worked for it? A terry punk? It's a Terry punk. I'm right, I'll be there. If I came up and he created a monster, I don't know. I think October one, whatever, nineteen ninety three, I wrestled with Samboo ironically my first night here on the E c W Arena. There's my match. I come to the back, you know, when I'm banked up, pretty good sweat and tired and blown up and whatnot. Terry funk. You know, I didn't know. You know, I'm just like the other guys. I was nurse to be around him, you know, pulling me aside by the wrist, called like somebody had a poor on my wrists. Get me a kid, you know, he said, if you don't mind, let me give you some. He critiqued my match, and I don't remember one thing he told me. I don't remember one thing he said. I was just like taking me. Wow that as a wrestler, you fans think you understand, you don't. Any wrestler hear knows when a veteran with a legend, when a man who is like I believe it was Perry said, paid the way in his business, pulls you aside and takes the time out of his night to contigue you. I was lucky, and I've been lucky to know Terry for about forty years. I'm bad with daycent times, but I've been lucky know Terry. And everybody's no talk talking great about Terry because Terry deserves it. I don't know, I'm twenty nine. I feel like I'm ninety three. He's fifty three and he doesn't christ anyway. Love Terry, thank you, and I'm sure you've been around for another fifty three years. Thanks a lot. Yeah, a lot of the people from Candido to Speccoli Saturn, these people just they either passed away or they fell on hard time. It's just remarkable. Ball's mahoney gets several shout outs. Some of the Terry Funk liked the lot. He died before Terry Funk did. Axel Rotten. Well, it's just this crazy story vcw is is not a great one. I mean people kind of get that, but if you actually just look at the yeah, it's not a great one. The roster rough shit, I mean, so many people, so many people end up in a tough space. Well, guess who's up next? Boss Barry Blaustein Oh Boy takes the dais next because he's shooting beyond the mat. He's shooting footage for it. And it's funny because Vicky gets up there and says, why don't you tell everybody what you've done? Like like she wants him to list the famous movies he's been involved with because she knows, oh god, they don't take him seriously enough. And she's so you could tell she's so ticked pink that someone with his resume wants to follow Terry Funk around. So that's kind of a rare moment of thirsting for the spotlight from Vicky, who's been kind of a very important but background character through the whole Uh oh, very much. Yeah, she never says anything. She's around, but she never says anything that we do hear from her will later and to beyond the Matt documentary when it finally comes out, and she's of course there at barely legal along with Terry's two daughters, and she's there when Terry gets out of his fucking bed and oh my god, is she ever tidy Whitey's and can barely move Terry get out of bed. In that movie, man, it's like it says it all, Oh, yeah, that's the story right there, that's the story. It's Berry blousting this guy. About two years ago, I started with his dream of wanted to do a documentary about professional wrestling, the documentary that would show the sport and show the peep general pep population out there. Well, I think it's the greatest sport going through this person. I remember approaching Terry about two years ago in Las Vegas and he just tore the house down and was backstage in a trailer and I got back there and his face was all full of blood and he looked up and he said, I'm getting too old for this ship. And Terry, I don't think you'll ever be too old for this. And over the years and trying to put this thing together, the image of Terry has kept me going because what I want to do with this film is to show the country, if a non wrestling fan, why the guys here are the greatest athletes going. Terry told me, he said, the one place you gotta go. I wasn't out for Los Angeles, and I wasn't familiar with E c W except through the Internet, and they kept saying you got to come to this place. You gotta come to this place, and I'm going, well, okay, and I was really thinking more of the Big Federation. Well, this is the Big Federation, and these guys have more of large and more soul, and they're in it for the right reason. And you fans are the most passionate fans I've ever seen the like to be highlighted and shown off. A great life. VICKI to tell you what else you've done, anything else in movies like with Annie Murphy Offess are coming to America, Boomerang and you Dirt and everybody I know in Los Angeles. I'm more excited about doing this film than anything I've ever done. I'm putting the hard myself in it than anything else I've ever done, and hope with the goal but that everyone in rest will see it and say, goddamn it, I'm proud of in this industry. People who heard the Under the Cinemat about Beyond the Matt Boss know about that guy, yes, they do. And his birthday party were oh god, yeah, he doesn't say that. This this crack. That's the fucking story right there. Embarrassing fucking birthday party. But he works that mic like a lifelong wrestling fan. I'll give you, Yeah, he does. He does. I think of blouste In there, What's what's he up to? I mean, I think Blaustein based on I mean, granted, he's still it's still early in the process. You know, we're not there, We're not you know, he hasn't he hasn't yet kind of dug in all the way to do them. And yeah, you know, I mean he's in the middle of production, and I I just I think I feel like there's that between when he when he when he first met Terry Funk and when the movie came out there there was a lot more shame on his end. Who's end? Bloustein really why I feel like there's you know, I think he kind of even says it in the opening thing, like you know when when you see that the camera kind of turn around, you know, dolly around him and stuff, and he kind of talks about the shame of being a wrestling fan, and uh, you know, he's definitely one of us. He's definitely invited to the boecue. Absolutely listen, he is. He is of that and and you know he's got more balls than than most. Honestly, Like when I played clips of that of that usc Q and a session, and they're like every question is like mocking him, right, and he's like talking about wrestling though, you know, Like I mean, I would ask him what his favorite match was, and he talks about he has an answer. I would have I would have fucking changed the subject before they even asked. Amazing of all the cloud he built up in Hollywood, he was not I would have said, I would have said, I would have said, no, you know, I know I didn't make that documentary. That's a different Barry Bloston. Yeah, it was all work pal, Yeah, a different guy. Different guy. See my cousin Barry Blasting Well. Next to the day is Paul Hayman. And as we know on Barely Legal ninety seven weekend, Paul Hayman was in full raw rod general Army general, motivate the troops mode, sure, and he certainly gave Terry Funk a lot to chew about and think about in terms of how formative the guy really was to what ECW became, not just because he was there when they first turned the lights on and set a ring up, but because, as we've mentioned before, particularly in our Flare episode, in the nineteen eighty nine WSW episode, he was there when Paul Hayman was there in NWA and Crockett, well not Crockett, but the Jim Herd era what would become WCW, and Paul Hayman was able to observe behaviors, ways of carrying yourself, dedication from Terry Funk to stay the course during the Rick flairfeud despite the cracked sacrom injury that he suffered that really kind of formed the basis of what Paul Hayman would look for and someone he would push hard in ECW And so it was quite something when you know, almost ten years later Paul Haman got to stand in frontitary Funk and say, you're taking us into this, this pay per view he's done to the individual performers. I'll ask you this, how many if your new Tanks was married? You know that that lady open there no woman, thanks, Sam Man, shut the fuck up. Doesn't go to a car. That man doesn't go out to a restaurant. He goes straight back to his room and he gets on the phone every night with that woman. Because that's the type of husband that he is. And he has never discussed publicly the fact there's a man behind the image of task. But he didn't care tonight to reveal that. He didn't mind that you see him sitting next to his life. Do you know why? Because he wanted his family to pay tribute to this man. He wanted him, He wanted himself, He wanted his wife to see what a special man we all get to work with. He wanted to be able to go home in a couple of weeks and say, hey, honey, I will Terry Funk was in our dressing room tonight and had someone else besides a wrestler understand the honor that it is when you were in the same dressing room as Terry Funcker, the dignity that it bestows upon us to be in the same dressing room as a Terry Funk. What it means to us all collectively and individually to stand and sit in the same dressing room as a Terry Funk. And although others may not understand, what a great honor it is to me, To me, it's like being in the presence of a pope. To mean, it's like getting an audience with the president. To me, there is no greater honor than being allowed to stand before you tonight and say that this product here has been endorsed by the hardest working man I've ever had the honor of sitting in a dressing room and looking at Terry Funk. And then Paul, of course, I'll tell you, you know, you know, Paul Hayman could easily run for president. He's just the greatest he could. He could He can make h he can make a fucking gourmet meal out of dog shit. Yeah, it was called e c W. How this guy could make these wrestlers believe that what they were doing was revolutionary. And you can't do anything this revolutionary unless you believe that you can do it. Yep, And that's it's unbelievable. That's it he called it. We'll get to it later. Terry called it his Hitler speeches. Oh for sure, stands before his troops and by the time it's over, you know, you could hate Paul him and you want to kill him because you I mean, you get it. You it's in. It's in ready to rumble too, you know him with the backstage uh promo right before the show, ready to run so wild. I'm sorry, I remember to be on the mat. Yeah, we're going to play that because so legendary. It's so legendary to get that look into, you know, the kind of speech that he would basically give the truth for every show. You know, it's like a he knew. He knew that what motivated these guys was to do a ton of things that the Big Two wouldn't do, and that required a lot of personal sacrifice on their party. But he made the sacrifice mean something. It's like war. You know you're going to ask people to go and die. It is incumbent upon you to convince them that they're dying for a purpose, that unless they were willing to die, some great thing would not exist, some great thing would not happen, some great service to humanity or the fans, or whatever the case may be. However wide you want to make the aperture would not be possible. You are in the unique position to make this an actual thing, to leave that mark on the world and to say you stood for something you believed in when you had the chance, when the opportunity presented itself for you to actually do something thing to make money that aligned with what you really in your heart wanted to do, want the change you wanted to see in your business and your world and your community, whatever the case may be. And for these ECW guys it really was it was like, this is we want to represent a space in wrestling for people that never would have had the opportunity to even have jobs or make an impact before Paul Hayman came along and created this idea of what ECW could be and the category it could occupy. And you got a guy like that. They can talk like that to these people. Sure, run through a wall for him. Every single person has a story about how they wanted to strangle Polly at some point because he fuck him on a payoff or lied to him, or you know, played hide the ball basically with them roller and you go to approach him and to yell at him, and by the time you get to him, he's made a face, or he's made a remark, or he's made a crack and you just want to hug the guy again. Right, if people work for free, you're the worker, Daddy. He's a worker, and he's one of the best there's ever been, high level. Look at his success in ww Look at the pole position he holds for the top earners from Rock to Roman. I mean, this guy just he's you can't beat him, can't out game him, you can't do it. He is a step ahead, and he was a step ahead at telling this bank would assemble before Barely Legal nineteen ninety seven. Why honoring Terry Funk made so much sense? Ahead of the defender head for the company. You know, paul Ley got a step ahead, went ahead and got a step ahead. I think that's right, and I think this piece of sound will prove that. Last year when we were heading in for the November remember I shot down with Todd. I said, Todd, what do you think should we go for it? Should we do it? Can we do it? What do you think paid for you? And he can't. It's time. This company's ready, the boys are ready, the people are ready, the audience is ready. It's there for us. Let's go and do it. And I said, Todd, we kind of build it on somebody. It can't just be the whole leacw concept. There has to be someone that leads us to the promising. There has to be somebody that is the shining example of if this is what you're about, you will achieve your goals in life. Look at each other. It didn't take but half a second. We knew who the man was that we should build this around. We knew the storyline that had to be old, and we knew the man that this pay per view should go down in history as a tribute to. I thank you all tonight for coming out honoring this man. I thank you all tonight for your support in this product that is a tribute to this man. I thank you all tonight for the audience that you have given us for tomorrow's show, Because if this show is what I think it will be, and if my dressing room can put in the performance and show the work ethic that I know my guys can give you, it's not just a tribute to the audience. It's not just a tribute to themselves. It's not just a display of how hard they work. So I swear to God that I mean this from the bottom of my heart. Tonight and tomorrow, especially, the work ethic that will be displayed by that dressing room tomorrow is a tribute to one man who showed us the way, who showed us the work ethic that we all strive to live up to. And that man, ladies in general, it's Terry Fok. You're ready to die. You're ready to die for that man. Yeah, absolutely, I'm there. After a quick piss break, the Funker took the stage to thank all of the assembled supporters and make a couple of remarks for this banquet scheduled for him. You spent some time talking about how far back the heritage of wrestling goes. It's, you know, reputation is the oldest sport known to man. About there's hieroglyphics on Egyptian cages. Cages, caves, cages. Brother, Yeah, that's a concern. That's a big concern right there, you know. And how there's even reference in the Bible to Jacob in fact wrestling with God. He considers wrestling something that's you know, it's deep in the rice for a man to want to wrestle, as they say, and it's a wonderful life. And here the Funker, before headlining ECW's first pay per view, a show that embodied what he sought to represent in the business in nineteen ninety seven, has this to say. I want to say something else. Mine over on my right, I'm on my left right. I believe you on the way that has life right on that list as my wife, and I would uh, my life good and I but what I like can say is if you've been my wife through thirty two years, that's a long time. I believe We've had no pomcast, we've had no disqualification. Managine, we've had double knockoffs, and we'd had everything that you can possibly imagine her and I have in thirty two years. But we've made it somewhere or another. I love her very much. I'm looking forward spending the rest of my life here and I'm looking forward to spending eternity with her. I loved her. Has got two dollars. I mean this SA season over there, Stacy has Beyonce ully twenty and she's a wonderful, wonderful daughter along with Brandy. Brandy ho stand up to. These kids are great kids. I love it now and where's my from? Is very farcas my daughter I want, I wanted, I told her, but I do. I love my family very much. And that's what's he gonna bring me to. This next announcement. The next announcement is is in nineteen ninety seven is my last year. I will not be wrestling anymore after the end of this year. And it doesn't matter and went to heavyweight belt losing or anything else. Is my last year, man, I'm through with it and this I might go back to Japan a few times on occasion, but the United States, it's done. It's over thirty two years. That's it. No serious and I and I've loved, I loved every minute of it. But it's time to go home. It's time to say goodbye. Doug Credit goes to the man in the arena, whose face is marred with blood, with sweat, with dirt, with dust, and sometimes tears, who errs and comes up short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, who knows the great devotions, and suppends himself for a worthy cause, and who went past, knows the triumph of high achievement, and through it have not worst fails, and does so daringly, so that his place will never be at de side of those cold and frigid souls. And no either victory ninety feet. What I have just told you is a professional wrestler that I love. It's one hundred percent. Believe me. I have a place for the winner. I love the loser. But the man is in my heart is the one that gives a hundred percent night after night, no matter if it's Tommy Dreamer, no matter if it's Mikey Whibreak, no matter who it is, it's a guy that has a compassion for what he times, for what he loves. I want to say this, you're closing. I'd like to have my family stand and everybody else stay down. I'd like for you all to stand, Honey and the kids, and we want to give you, all of you out here, the four six of us. No view got you stop the Tommy. We want to give you a standing ovation for your great devotions, for us famous Jim and your great enthusiasms, for you reaching deep into your pockets, for you spending your heart or in cash to buy those tickets and make this company of work. And you're the messers. I want to go ahead and give you a standing and standing ovation because I love each and affray one of you from the bottom of my heart, and so does my family and God blessings. So the standing out thing didn't quite work out, but it was a nice idea Funk thanking the fans there and a hotel ballroom the night before barely the legal nineteen ninety seven you heard him acknowledge his family. As we know from Beyond the Matter, wasn't too long after his daughter was actually married. They documented that Terry Funk in a tuxedo giving away his daughter. Quite something to be able to document. And you know, we didn't talk a lot about this as we've gone along in the Lapsed Fan, but one thing he talked to Steve Austin about to Terry Funk when he was on his podcast was about the idea of when he would smarten his daughters up. Oh remem when he was a kid, he would he would go to the matches thinking his old dad was really getting his ass kick. The far New Yorks talked the same way about Fritz, and it took a long time before they really realized that there was a not a long time, but longer than you'd think, considering you're you're you're owner of the territory, not just a wrestler in the business, to learn that, you know, dad wasn't in there actually fighting for his life every night, and he didn't have to cover your eyes when he was getting beat up on and stuff like that. I want to go ahead and tell you that that, you know, my my, my young daughters. What I do is fake the top, the talk, the talk. I don't have a real job if you can't consider this real, honey, I mean, I know, I know I get paid. Yeah yeah, but well, daddy, daddy, what about all the bumps and bruises, Well, that part is real, But daddy, what about the blood when you cut your face open? Yeah yeah, well yeah, yeah, yeah, that part is real. But about the fact that how about how about daddy, how about the fact that you're never home? That part is real? So what what isn't real? Daddy? Well, the finishes are predetermined. These kids are like five to wait, daddy. Yeah, he's like a beaten down man. At this point you realize how pathetic it really is. What have I done with my life? So, Daddy, you get beat up, you get blood and and and you lea and you stay away from us. I gotta correct you there. I go ahead and stay away from it, and you do it all for for for this thing where the finishes are predetermined. They learned predetermined really quickly, didn't they. They were the only kindergarteners at the school that knew the word predetermined. I'll tell you that. Yeah, Yeah, that's that's that's what I know. Kids. When they say it that way, it really it doesn't sound like a hell up a lot, does it? You know? Yeah, it doesn't well, you know, it doesn't sound like I do anything that that's the very honorable doesn't sounds so you know wonderful that daddy. Yeah, do you love the fans more than us? No? Hold, make a suggestion two parts, daddy, Yeah, do you love the fans and then go ahead, what's his answer? Yeah, I do, I do love the fans. And then daddy, yeah, yeah, do you love the fans more than us? Yeah? Colapsed Funk. So, uh, the Funcker did talk to Steve Austin as I mentioned about kind of the role of getting his family involved in the business, whether they'd come to the shows or not, And you know, we talked about how there's something his wife, uh you know, he didn't really want to come into the matches, but they watched and they believed, and he never did smarten them up until they were about fifteen or sixteen, and so so Terry Funk's daughters were daddy freshman in high school. I do not know if Resley was real. Daddy. Yeah, my friends in school say that what you do is fake? Is it fake? No, Daddy, are you lying to me? Well, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus just as long as well. Uh, am I lying? Do you? That's what I asked, Sad is real? Yes? Are you lying to me? Yes? What? Did I wait a minute? Did I say yes, you don't know dad? What I said? Yes too? Did I go ahead and say yes, I don't know what I said? Yes too? I'm I'm you know, I got beaten up so bad in my real fight. He calls it his real fight. No, Dad, no Dad, you didn't go ahead and say yes, you went behind and said yes. Oh you know, Daddy gets a little knocked up when he has it's real fights for work. I like you, honey, you know so Sometimes I think I went to the bathroom and I didn't did I Daddy is wrestling really fourteen seconds later? Sometimes I think I went to the bathroom and I didn't on ahead and did Daddy go ahead and go party? Daddy? I don't even know if you are a real worker. Well, I can tell you all honestly, I am a worker. You can ask Dusty Road the work. If they're working, you and you and you, they're working as he's a worker. He's a worker, worker, that's all he is. Chase a worker. I'm not sure the girls laughed like the R video crew did there. They're about fifteen sixteen. Yeah, and they really appreciated the business. It was the way he smarked me up. I was afraid. I was smart, but I was afraid just say anything I got my face slapped or something. You know, the hardcore stump there in ECW and the stuff I read about you and making Barbarre explode. Though this is actually I think Steve Austin talking. I mean, you guys are literally you're working, but you're talking a shit pile of You're taking a shit pile of punishment just from the elements into that thing, the elements designed into that thing. That's that's such as describing someone, yes, lighting someone on fire. I'm sure you guys did. Man. Well, you know, Steve, at the time, I was willing to do it because the time I was making exceptional money over there, and at that time we had no TV in that group that was there, and it was just in independent group. So the Japan deathmatch is not a so yeah, fifteen sixteen, can you believe it? So? Fortunately, I think it's Brandy of the two daughters that gets married and beyond the mat she knows it's not real when she when she gets married, but she gets married. Do you think he'll quit? Think he really is seeing serious about it lately. He's really goodbye to us and Brandy, don't you think. Yeah? I think for once in his lifetime, I think he may be as serious. I mean, he really has started just talking about it a lot, and before he ever talked about it. I think he knows we're serious now too, that we're really worried about him as far as his health and physically and all that. You know, he should not be wrestling at all for probably about i'd said, the last five to ten years. Whatnety Stacy busy the mother, okay, his mother, thank you for life itself and the joys of life. And may Stacey and Kelly have those joys and cherish them and always be joyful. Christ name, we pray, Amen, Amen, okay the greatest. How can a man be so tender outside the ring and so brutal? Is it? The deal is? Uh, it's fun. I think that's a lot of it. It's fun. I guess. I guess you know what it is. He wants that restl for thirty two years, you know, and I said, boy, that's a long career. You know. Maybe I wouldn't smart enough to do anything else and might are living at it. I don't know, you know, how about that? Boss? Mm hmmm. That's what it is. That's it. There scenes from Terry Funk. Daddy. If you go away, Daddy, I need I want you to retire. If you don't retire sometime soon, I'm never going to speak to you again. Daddy. Well, well it's been nice talking to you. Then he went away to say bad to your daughter. But nice talking to you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, daddy? What honey paste it? What a? What a what a spectrum of noises from your face just there. It's like six or seven different stages. It's the laps funk after all. You know, it's not I'm not I'm not saying something. It's not true. No, it is here we are you see dumb Part three? What the fuck right? Jesus christ Man. Of all the things I can say about that little revelation there, the only word that comes to mind is correct. Oh if you think that, if you think that accent is off the mark we do hear from Vicky briefly here and Beyond the mat is, of course, Barry Blaustein's asking her questions about where where her husband stands in nineteen ninety seven. I honestly think that my husband's fearless, and that's true. He would. I just don't think he's a fright of anything. I don't forget that Brandon Aaron is in the trunk. I wanted him to stop wrestling since probably nineteen ninety. I've decided that it's his profession and it's up to him when he's gonna quit. Honey. I heard, I heard that you were telling the girls that you want me to start wrestling. You can come to me with that anytime, you know. I heard you said you wanted me to retire in nineteen ninety seven. Now, Terry, it's nineteen ninety I was kind of thinking right now, Oh, so you want me to retire in nineteen ninety seven. That's interesting, you know, I thought of a lot of years, Vicky, and you know, yeah, yeah, And you know what I want to head. You know what thing is. I'll tell you. I'll tell you what you know. You know, Vickyard, I don't mind. I'll retire whenever you want me to retire. But can I un retire and then retire again? I'll tell you what. You know. When the girls were we're little, and we had a hard time keeping them out of the snack drawer. Yeah, I remember that over there and ahead and got all kinds of who done it's and watch your McCall it's in there, and and who's who done. It isn't It isn't a candy terry. You know I want to have them? Well, I want to had made up a candy bar. Laps funk moment there it is. Hold on, How did it come to this? I challenge you in like five years or t LF double X to put piece together. Why it suddenly came to you saying I want ahead and made up a candy bar. Oh so that when they had trouble keeping him out of the snack drawer, and we would say, you know, honey, you hate you eat that snack. But every time you eat a snack, it's going to be, you know, a week before you can have another one, So you better hold up. We can have one tomorrow, but if you have one today, it's going to be an extra week. I'm kind of thinking that way right now. You know, we're talking about when I might you know, uh, you know, go away, and you know time to go and I appreciate that. But how about we work out a deal where every time you ask me to retire, I say I will seven years from the day you asked me. So you've already used up one of your credits here in nineteen ninety and it's uh yeah, looks like it's going to be ninety seven. Okay, I'm just going up again and it'll be another seven years. How about that? How about or how about it comes down to the fact, I'll decide whenever I'll fucking want to retire. How about its compound interest, Vicky? You help Come about every time you ask me a double So next time you ask me to be fourteen years from then, how about next time you ask me to retire, I could get yes. He says that to his wife. How about next time you asked me to retire, Vicky, I kick your ass? Oh? Have you have you guys heard about this podcast, this wrestling podcast that's done like forty hours on dad? Have you heard about it? I heard? It was so flattering and they went through his whole life and his whole career. Six weeks later, they get to ECW Part three. You tell me to retire one more time, Vicky, and I'm gonna kick your ass. That's lapsed. That's what it is. So you mentioned that speech that PAULI gives backstage yes before Bare Legal nineteen ninety seven is captured by Barry Blasting's cameras. It's a beautiful bit of serendipity that he was there. He was blessed with oh yeah, this turn of events. So here it is, this is the speech. This is the raw ra in a quick shout out even even here to Terry Funk, Paul, he been standing if you haven't seen it on like a staircase overlooking where all the boys are sitting in chairs. Listen. Oh, I mean he's he's got a fucking he's got his uh uh uh what do you call it? Like that like in church there the thing where they do the readings from alp in like old a pulpit exactly is what it is. He's got a pulpit and and he you know again, seriously, it's a Hitler speech. It's exactly what it is. Seventeen million homes that have availability for this show tonight. It will pay twenty dollars hopefully for the privilege to see you guys do what you have done for three and a half years. Thank Terry Funk for all he's done for this company, for help putting us on the map, for being unselfish and selfish times, for taking the young guys and showing them a better way. Tonight, we have a chance to say, yeah, you're right. We're too extreme, we're too wild, we're too out of control, we're too full of our own shit. Well we have a chance to say, hey, fuck you, you're wrong. Fuck you were right, because you have all made it to the dance, because, believe me, this is the dance. There it is, good ship, there it is, And here's Paul up tire me. Terry. In the director's commentary, you mentioned from the Beyond the Matt DVD release, sitting with Barry Blaustein and then the scene arrives. He reflects on, uh, on what Paul's speeches were all about and through it. How inspiring are Paul's speeches? I mean, you've been around for ever, do you think these are inspiring? Listen? You know, absolutely absolutely Paul touches my heart whenever he gives one of those. And I know that I don't know where it's coming from, but I know, I said, Paul, I know that he's gonna go ahead and give us a bunch of bullshit to day and Dad gummet, and I'm not going to go ahead and go for this bullshit. And he'll start talking and pretty soon as he'll have me pumped up and everybody else in the room pumped up and ready to go, and and honestly, raise abub bob, what's your normal performance for being ringed? Paul can do that and you know that, dad, come a. Paul Hayman's full of craft. But but boy, I'll tell you what you just you just love what he says and you want to hear it. He would have made He would have made a great football coach. I promise you he could have motivated those players wonderfully. He missed his calling there. He really did. Look even got the old man doing push ups there. You know, he must have given a pretty inspigrational speech as they show Funk doing yep and wetting his hair with a yes, what are those sprayouts? That's great stuff? Because it's so great. And that's it. He said it there. It wasn't just making you believe ECW was a thing worth wrestling for. It was saying things that made you do things in the ring that other promoters you wouldn't do it for, you wouldn't think about it, and no one would hold it against you. Vince McMahon is not giving speeches that make people want to go in the Ring and Moon salt off a ladder at sixty years old. Right, they may do it, but it's not because the promoter managed to give them a speech that made them think, Tonight it's do or die. Tonight. If you're ever going to take the risk is the night. If you're ever going to go further than you think you're capable of, if you're going to exceed your own limitations, Tonight is the night. And man, he got every last drop out of that talent roster. He really did some all the way to an early grave. As we know, yeah, we're obliged to point out, but still that's the magic. And as we've talked about in his book, this is how he puts it. Terry Funk. He loved to give his hitler's speeches before the ECW shows. Awesome. He would get everyone, including me REVVD up to go out and kick some ass. You would tell the guys how no one thought the company could make it, how they all had something to prove every single show. When he was finished, all the boys were a frenzy and he was their commander in chief. Some of them would have taken a bullet for him. Hail Hile Paul. He right, wow, holy shit. So with that win did our sales and at THECW roster sales, will pull up a disc twenty nine Boss, it's time to dive in both the go home promo work that Terry Funk did with Raven ahead of the Barely Legal show. Raven of course coming into the pay per view champion, and he would leave ECW almost immediately after Barely Legal and doing business here with the Funker to go to w CW. As we know, he debuts in WCW in nineteen ninety seven, forms Raven's flock and a takeoff of a lot of the stuff he'd been doing a ECW and in VECs bring some talent over, including Stevie Richards and some others. But yeah, once you get this twenty nine up, it's one oh seven oh four, we're going to start with some Terry Funk and Raven promos that run ECW television and the final weeks leading up to Barely Legal in April, okay of ninety seven. You're ready, I am ready, So hit play in three two one play, he little lass, there's a start. You think you're doing fun? Well, you want to talk about my old man? You want to talk about me. You want to say that I uh am a big cry baby. Let me tell you something. I am an old bastard and you can't pull on my heartstrings. And yeah, I love a lot of different things. I love my kids, I love my family. I'm not like you. I love my old man. Let me tell you something. You're the whimpy little bastard. What'd you say? The whitney little bastard wol corner and won't stand up on her damn feet because you just don't have it between life. You're not going to go me into fight you funk. I don't need to fight you. You got to get through a three way dancy get to meet funk. You don't know no funk. You're not going to get me wild up. You go ahead, you keep on going ahead, counting in, going to end, pumping off, telling me what you're gonna do. Well, let me tell you something. I'm gonna tell you that you hurt and I gonna do not gonna tell me now I'm sure them you shut your damn mouth, your son of a bit. You want to come out, get why you wading me for a long time? Why did not you do her? I'm right here. I don't out at all. Get out. I don't have the ball boy, that's your problem. I don't want to wake you on, you man cat. You say that he had asked you. Get I just pulling out. Can't it up? Damn? You get up and fight me now, get out the best you can do. Yes, don't my old man fight the best? Come on, get out, shut up? Fight me the fucker never more? You be what the never? And they battle in the mock bet. There ain't nobody to say you now, damn you file damn. Sometimes in life we make our own choices. Sometimes our choices are made for us, and sometimes there is no choice at all. So it is written, and so it shall come to pass. I visited an old friend of mine today, a hundred and seventeen year old gypsy lady who makes her living by telling people's fortunes. As we sat down and she went in the trance, she starts speaking some sort of gibberish, and I could make out the words fear and dreams, And then she started singing the song for my youth. And when listen carefully to the sound, as the heartbeat drives you mad in the stillness and the memory of what you had and what you lost, and what you had and what you lost, and made me think of the day they first took the ECW World title away from me, and I was sitting in rehab for addictions that for no one's business with my own, and a junkie walked up to me, I'm a methadone to try and clean him up, and he said to me, he goes, what would you be doing right now if you weren't here, cause obviously he'd be outscoring. And then and there it sunk into me the pain, the anguish of what it meant to lose one of the only two things in my life that I loved. And now I got three guns leaders coming for me, the Sandman, Stevie Richards, and Terry Funk. I'm gonna have to be mister Mirror to pull this one off, because those are three determined individuals, three men who hate me, three men who despise me, and three men who want to wear my title more than anything they want in their entire lives. And all that pain that I'm gonna have to suffer, and all that anguish and the torment and the desperation, it makes me feel alive. I feel my own pain and I like it. Quote the World Anyway Champion forevermore. Okay, but I come here a lot. I need strength. I'm better now. Sometimes I get a twitch in my eye. I'm a dead gum lump in my throat. I'm gonna try and not let that happen. Today. It's Terry wat double Cross Rancho Can. He loved this part of I think this is a great place for him to be. His gravestone says, do not stand at my grave and cry, I am not here. I did not die. What would you have your graves if you didn't? Thirteenth at the e c W pay per View. The people that I love are going to be there, and I'm sure my father will be there. He better be if he's not in his grave. If I make it through the Three Way Dance with Stevie Richards and Sam Man, if I make it to Raven and Medium for the e c W A World Championship, I have to do it one step at a time, one step out of town. Damn, this one's for you. Depot another sounds. You've been out as big. Go to the well with the funker an easy day, man, You're showing a picture after research stas fry. I'm not there. I did not die up. It's like, okay, find that Jesus tracts can hurt. Just gave him my respects. I can't cry. I gotta get out of you. Please join us for sending this from time life time Warner, from time, from time to time, Cyndi lauper ladies and gentlemen. So here we go. They're legal at this time. I would like to introduce my special guest color commentator for this next matchup, the Innovator of Violence time dream has uh Has Joey Styles ever heard of going to a tailor, you know, getting his fucking clothes brought in a little bit? Who's that? Joey Styles? Like his his clothes are giant, totally massive, Like could he not fucking get go to a tailor and have them brought in a little bit? I mean, Jesus looks like a he looks like a fucking fourth grader wearing his dad's suit. That was the thing though, baggy suits in the nineties were I was that wasn't There wasn't a a slim cut obsession back there were right back there, you know, not now at the kids think SKay jeans are cringe. I know, azer, I'm not being like having the slim cut. It's just about having like a a cut that flatters your body, your physique, and that does not flatter Joey styles. So here's a Blue World Order, speaking of physiques. Jesus Christ, Yes, speaking of physiques, there's a Blue Mean Hollywood Supernova Big Stevie Cool so obviously a mockery of the nWo. That's the fake Dennis Rod Blue World Order Stevie Richards, Sandman and Terry Funk in a three way dance to determine who then immediately has to turn around and wrestle Raven and the Rave was doing that promo talking about he's got three gun slingers coming for him and he's got to overcome these in criminal odds. It's like, dude, you get whoever survives this fucking knockdown, drag out three way with no rest. But that that was the Raven character. You know, he would he would always feel put upon. I don't know how much success he was having. Were I was not able to hear very well, Were you coping okay? With that Raven promo? That was it's you know, it's funny, there's there. It's like the the you know what, one of the main elements that's missing in his promos. What's that? I mean, first of all, he looks like such a douche. Well, he looks like such a fucking water by design. Great, it's it's it's a design that like I I want to I want to love to hate somebody. I don't want to hate to somebody. And that the it's also his voice. His voice is not a good promo voice, Like I don't like. His words are great. I won't deny that his words are great, but everything else sucks. It's fucking weirdo Sandman. Sandman already busts into the forehead cigarette hanging out and he comes to the crowd. This time he's got a beard in his hand. Yeah, he's because it's fucking pants on there. Where the fuck those bagg the motherfucking things are? Well? I mean, what was was the Sandman gimmick? I don't really. It's just a guy that sits on the couch and drinks and smokes and kicks ass. He's a drunklisically yeah, drunk and philly Okay, probably someone that a lot of Philly kids, all these all these people know well they actually probably are everyone in the crowd probably is this guy to their families and friends. Totally yeah, yeah, yeah, this would be like if hear of Boston, this guy would be like a you know, a construction work Oh totally. Yeah. Of course Steve Austin took the whole beer thing from him. Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, they're playing that. This is the Network version. I think because they're playing on it sounds like a Motorhead version of Under the Sandman, which they have rights to. But Sandman were different because because the relationship and Motorhead and Triple H, I suppose that Sandman very much came out to the Metallica Entered the Sandman. I was there for a couple of those entrances fucking while I'm telling you, Nan, if you went to one of those shows and saw some of those entrances fucking awesome, all right, maybe maybe he was. That's like I'm trying to articulate it. Like ECW did the character development very well, Yeah, they really did. The promos were great, the entrances were awesome. They had guys that knew how to like get over and like communicate to the fans. It wasn't just a bunch of guys that are out there playing wrestler and hurting themselves. Yeah, Allen did. They all did a work in him somewhere. Not for big money though. It's a little banks there in the front row or w from w w W. Where's the very hard to be standing n Look at that. Look at those ladies. They want him so bad. That's a big It's like a higher, higher class occasion. Look at him, pour that beard down, his bella the whole game. They're like, I'll take your cock right now. Okay, I'll look at this guy. That's sad. This is one of those things when you heard about this guy, I mean the Sandman back in the p w I days, and you were right, what the fuck is this guy? Like, that's the same man. He looks like, what does that even mean for him to call this sand Now? It looks like a bomb. I still remember that very vividly, first getting my taste of like Tommy Dreamer. It was just like a full color photo in PWIVE and bleeding from the head and he's just got like a shirt and black pants on him, like Tommy Dreamer. You know, wrestlers and T shirts wasn't a thing in nineteen ninety six and seven, Like it was an easy duck and it was I also like alluring. There were these names you never heard of, and these guys bleeding in these small buildings, and yeah, just I don't know, just you just picked up that something really off? What's going on here? This Christ? He's still just nothing's happened? Was this a fucking triple h entrance? Jesus? Pretty much? Yeah, he would take you longer than that's usually usually come through the crowd. And he'd liked lacky. He'd spit beer and smash cans, like five or six cans all around the building. Oh so now we wait for the entrance to the funker. Here he comes. I mean, nothing is more disturbing than you know, because, like you think about the cuts that he gets. He makes himself bleed by ramming a fucking by bashing a can in his head, which is like either he's bashing the can hard enough on his head that he's bleeding from matt or you know, the thin tin is like ripping and shredding his fucking head. Absolutely, And that's before he gets in the ring. Contender of course, Tommy Dramer was scared of a third contender. It came up his spot for his mentor, Harry Thawing up. Yeah, we at two hundred thirty one pounds, a member of the w Big Stevie ko Man, there's big. That's fine for this guy. People used to talk about him like a Shawn Michaels type. Yeah. I remember when he came in ninety nine to WWF. I was like, oh shit, this guy's like Shawn Michaels. He's gonna be the new Shawn Michaels. He's coming in super kicking. He even kind of looks like he could easily be, you know, like Steve Michaels. Steve, this is he a w W Steve punk fishing handshakes to his opposition. He's a you know, he's a he's a competitor, he's a provide sportsmanship WAD two hundred and here's the bib intro the pay per view legend, Why man Terry? What if the guy? What if the Nations said Terry for his mentor Terry and put an unselfish act. And that is so very, very very rare in this business. That sounds and offers a canna be or I'm not want ahead. No, I don't drink before the match. I drink after the match. And he's gonna smash it against his fucking head. I always Richards Narry smashes there. It is bunker hits the robes and were underway, and you don't forget this is easy dub, this is live. So the ring is going to sound like this. This building has been a less in my whole life. But you know, Terry, what what was the Sandman's deal with the with the kendo stick? I'm sorry, what was the Sandman's dealing with a kendow stick? You probably told me that you always came out with it was Singapore cane because they had that case where that American right, but what triple side edlock getting back to the triple spots right out of the gate there. But I guess my thing is is like, but why did he bring it out? Because just like what was his relation to the case. I think when the case came out, they just wanted to use it as a gimmick for somebody that was a hot heel on the roster, and there he was. I see. That's pretty much of that triple lock up. They're doing three way spots here. No one's hit the floor yet. Double Team were Richards in the corner. So while this is in the archive, we did it in typical deep dive fashion when we watched it and then went went through our notes, as opposed to this where we're doing a watch along. So yeahly this is a little more it's a little different in flavor. I look at the Funker with those lefts and chops. They're both double Team and on a Richards until the open hands slapped him. Stand man of the Funker, and the Funker says, oh yeah, And I talked about this when we did the show, but I was so bummed when I realized that my cable provider wasn't carrying this pay per view. I was sitting there that night trying to buy it, trying to see like any indication that I could get it. No, no, no, no, we're not listen. It's sorry, we're not We're not fucking doing this. What what is ec that you mean? W c W? Is that what you're talking about? God, that's what I mean. Sorry, Sorry, I totally fucked it up. You're right, I met w c W. Imagine that son, I don't believe they have a show going on tonight. Caud it's your son, don't forget. That's a great sign. So Funk went for a quick spinning toe hold, but he his elbowed. He was close lying down, And now Sandman and Richard are dropping the elbows on the Funker center of the ring and watch guys. Tommy Drimmers saying it's already hard for me to sit up there and watch two guys do this to try where Uh I also think this is I believe. I believe this match. Uh wrestle Mammia last the beginning of last year. Oh my god, you watched this one. I haven't heard that one. Yeah, yeah, it's phenomenal, but it made you choose this one. I think we hadn't watched e c W. I wanted to. She hates ec W. Ye't imagine apple doesn't fall far from the tree? Yeah, not at all. I know that's a clever one. So Sandman was picking up Stevie Richards and dropping on Funk's face with leg drops, and then he went to do it again and just backsup like Stevie Richards. Bunker now taking over with swinging neck breakers in the center of the ring on Big Stevie Cool. Sandman has disappeared at ringside, probably going to get a libation. Yeah, three Hangman's news neck breakers in succession by the Funker looking for the world title birth looking to well, like you said, Boss finished the story. That's right, that we're all here to do, and Sandman emerges with the ladder. Apparently he went over to home depot. Oh God Jesus, he throws the ladder in the ring from the floor at last, it's right across the back of Terry Funk's head. E C dub. Remember their ladder use maybe so uncomfortable compared to like the clean ladder use of Sean and Razor. Yeah, they just throw this jagged edge, shitty looking ladder all around the ringing at each other and oh this was actually no you know this was This was the the day after Christmas. This was the episode last year. Yep. Anyway, it's a rare color commentator Jordan Joey stains in the booth. He used to always talk about how proud he was of this one night, one man performance for this match. I guess according to some of the comments, I guess my mom asked if anyone actually get paid from this promotion. Well, it's a long story. That's a good one. She can tell just by looking at I guess he also tied. So she tied E C W from nineteen ninety seven with the January sixth. Oh Jesus thing, fucking hell that was. That's the last one to listen to. Yeah, she sees a mob, that's what she sees. No fall, he's on the ladder. No there it is, Oh Jesus Christ, get enough rotation at all? He just like it's like he stops. He stops at mid moon salt. He does. It's like he stops mid moon salt and just fucking fall. He goes straight down. Oh, Terry came to barely Legal. He's w's first pay per view. He came to barely legal to barely moon Salt. He's stood in that ladder Stevie Richards standing in the canvas and he just let it all hang loose and he came straight down in his head and look at him ailing on the canvas. Oh wana, oh god, VICKI exactly. She's they show where I'm beyond the mat and the daughters they're up in the you know, towards the back of the building with their hands on their face like, oh, our left hand from the Sandman drops Funk and he flare flops right on to the ladder and it made a sickening crack. Just brutal. Fong said, you know what is his pay per view? First one, I will moon salt. I will horrify a life insurance actuary somewhere. Stevie Richards is slammed on top of Terry Funk by the Sandman. See the guy pretending to be Sean waltonan there pretending to be six with a camera. That's Rob Finstein of our video. That's the guy I had to slip the fifties to talk to Brett Hart. That's so fucking funny for h Montreal. Oh super kicked by Stevie into the ladder, puts down. Sandman gets two on the cover very close. People definitely thought this was Stevie Richards to night by the way, as much story as they were telling about the Funk are doing it for his dad, and all definitely thought it was real. It was gonna be a coronation because he had a long standing feud and Rave and he was in the flock and then he he broke free and formed the BWO and story was there for the taking, but they didn't pull the trigger good enough because they left together anyway later in the year. Who was the hul Cogan of the BWO that was? Do you remember how name did he use in WWE Nova? Oh my god? He was like the the Tony Robbins workout guy in the jumpsuit with the little microphone attached to his ear. Oh, it was his name in ww Mike Boucie is his real name? Yeah, I remember you're talking about. I forgot the name they gave him the second okay. And who was Scott Hall? Well, that was the the blue guy, the blue meaning. Oh, he was Scott Hall. Scott Hall. And Stevie Richards is Diesel big Stevie Cool? Yeah right, I got, I got. That was a big big Steve. I never remember who did a Rodman was? I forgot? They had a Dennis Rodman in there. That's a hot T shirt man WO shirt. Sure that was hard to get climbing, and I was he good? South did? Oh Jesus Richard's and Sandman in the ladder funk stands up and not even knowing he's doing it, backs into the ladder and tips both of them into a hot shot on the top rope. Jesus Christ like loves that's the hu whie. She's wearing these fucking cut off shorts. Yeah, the daisy dukes fucking cock Oh yeah, here we got. Picks up the ladder across his shoulders and starts spinning around and I want ahead, and did an airplane spin with it the ladder. The fucker, that's the last a helicopter. Oh my god, he killed me. I want to go home. And then he drops into his own head. Look at the car, Vicky, I got a long head. Oh there on their feet, they're standing. How can you not be inspired by the hardcore legendary punk Well, okay, well sticking his head in the ladder, and maybe I have no I have no desire to be to put my head through a fucking ladder and spin around like a dufis like a top like a Yeah. So that was a legendars, but a lot of people stole that. Afterwards, the ladder leaned up against the ropes and funking sand Man taking turns slamming each other's heads into the rungs. Meanwhile, Stevie Rich oh yes, enters the frame from the top rope here. I think I remember what happens here. The teeter totter is the ladder in their face. Oh oh, that's just not okay. Actually, it's kind of annoying to me. Now, this is the I actually watched it this way, the third time I've watched this match. Yeah, that's amazing. That's not okay. If you're wondering for the uninitiated that might not know about this at our tip top tier on Patreon. We know it isn't for everybody, but it's for enough people that we reserve special privileges. It's the Moat Tier, fifty dollars a month, near and dear to our hearts. The fan our rider dies, the fans we save from the Berney Building, and they get wrestle Mamia. Yes, every single week Stevie Richards. It's a super con concerned and it only gets two fans reacting that they thought that could have been the finish wrestle Mammia Monday. That's right. Every every mondays down at his mom and watches a truly a colectic mix of wrestling matches and it's just unbolt a wild whatever. It is, like just a total wild mix. It's very she's she's been to Japan, she's been to ECWS, she's been obviously WWE and WW and just you know, almost everywhere in between. We got an old school, like really old like because because her parents were fans of Killer Kowalski. It's like we've seemed just a real wild batch of matches and her comments are never, are never, ever dull. It's remarkable. It's really like that voice that you're missing from your childhood of the parent in the room that like, yeah, kind of tolerates your enjoyment of it, but has questions about how it all works. Oh Man, Stevie Richards in the crowd ladder leaned over. Sandman lunges over the top rope, grabs the end of the ladder that's you know, towards the ring and seesaws it upright into uh. Stevie Richard's fucking Sydney Pollock over here and in the fucking suit. So they did a nice new finish on the arena floor. It's not that grinding brown concrete anymore. Well, the funkers found a chair and he's crowning Stevie Richards and Sandman and he's stumbling around. Absolute love, like fucking you get a cop looking motherfucker over here watching a guy get hit in the head with a he's being paid to not arrest this man. Basically left again Funk now bridging the ladder fails. Jesus Bunk's doing the whole like you know. What I love about Funk is that he just doesn't give it. He doesn't like he he he, The ladder doesn't stick, and he does he go back to fix it up. No, he does not give a show. He's out there conduct, he doesn't have a plan. Something occurs to him, but it's not like we absolutely have to do this spot or the match comes to a screeching home. Oh no oh Jesus Sandman from the flour throws but looks to be a beer keg or trash can into the ring and it lands right on Terry Funk's head and makes an incredible noise. Still Funk able to scramble to cover Stevie Richards and gets to for the beer keg to be brutal. They play that and beyond the mat too, and like this crash sequence of all the things that happened to Terry Funk showing his daughters horrified in every fucking move. And that's a big water that thing lands on his head. Oh yeah, it's a horrendous crashing one. You can tell it's like paper thin, but still great stuff there. Terry stands up and walks as casually as you've ever seen. I want to take out the goddamn trash can wrapped in steel, Joe, that's a trash can wrapped in steel. Thanks Tommy O dumb bitch. She plays onto it and Sandman stands there and watches Richards get covered. This is elimination, though does not elimination. They sure the ones. The famous one goes to a draw, so you don't really find out in this industry today with Savu and Terry Fun dance yea she had as a spike pile driver from Terry Funk and the Sandman working together, plants Stevie Richards into the canvas. C W anyway, title picture. This is your favorite ECW match at this point, boss, Yeah, must be again, fum just nailing Stevie sans got the ladder. Oh ship, I'm gonna go ahead and get the funk out of here. Yep, Sandman's gonna do the outside in I drop on the ladder, Richard's that was rough covered by Funk. One dude not enough despite crushing Stevie under the ladder. I'll give him credit. Man, he's a tough kid. I remember so excitedly showing my friends who were that casual wrestling fans in CW actually is like thinking they would care about the lat Scot chair they give some of them really did some of them like there. I had friends that would only go to w Yeah, I mean, because there's oh fuck, that's right. It goes into the crowd, the seesaw ladder, Sadman launched in the air a man like freshman sophomore year. We'd all get our dub shirts on it. It's wild go to the I mean, it's it's a uh yeah. I mean because if you're if you're familiar with wrestling but aren't like a crazy fan, you're gonna look at this and say, holy shit, Like you can't, like, you know, everyone thinks that they like they don't even hit each other and they don't do that. But this you can tell that it's real violence, and so obviously everything else must be real exactly. Double Power Mom, Double Pin and Terry Funk and the Sandman have eliminated Stevie Richards a little bit out of the crowd in that one. You can kind of hear it. You're soft fish Fisher Stevens that are not walking about the stars studied. It's Todd Gordon and a handshake between FuG and Sandman seated on the canvas and they start swinging before they can even stand up. One of the terry club there we go, no, and then back dropped out on the Richards and you know what time it is. No, he doesn't do it here, you already get it off. A damn ladder psychopath, a funker. Okay, I don't know how the Sandman is still standing. He is supposed to be getting something from under the rings that it just lets up. Oh fuck it. I don't understand why the streamers wrapped in barbed wire, Why they didn't just use barbed wire, Why they were wrapped in streamers? I never understood that. Kah, the streamers were there by mistake. Maybe there wasn't the intention. Ah Jesus crown Sandman who loads that ribboned barbed wire into the ring and Fog puts the shirt over Sandman's head and start to thinking punching. It's amazing how much weight he lost by the time he came down to be It's now Funk trying to work with the barb wire and he's gonna whip Sandman across his bear back with it. It's stick it in there. Oh awful. See dub dub dub pc dub dub. Now Sandman decides to wrap his body you the barbed wire. He see dumb do the barge kind of thing. You're the Funk are bumping aptain wire. Sandman climbs to the top rope with a tail basically sticking out of his ax. He does, ladrus fucking idiot. What a goofball. That was one of the funniest leg drops I've ever seen him. Yea, brother, he just like took off before he could even get his footing. Now what's he doing? Terry Funk putting his foot in the trash can? Stevie Richard, I want to haven't found the trash can and said hello, Mama, here I come again, Mama. That's the big why Mama the big click. Funk puts the trash can on Sandman's head and punches the ship out of the trash can. Big Left Stevie super kicks the trash can on Sandman's head. Bunk's gonna go a hand. Here we go, he's climbing. Oh god. Sandman moves into position and it started with the boot salt and it ends with his face again. Christ but three, that means I virtue with the one two three. He's gonna face Raven, the ECW champion, who hits the ring in an instant. I like that belt. That's this natty looking bell. It's not very extreme, but I like that. I also love their belts. The barbed wire one is I'm not a huge I mean, obviously it's very flavorful, but that's fine. Hot. I didn't like this the barbier ones. Yeah. So the bell sounds and immediately Terry Funk versus Raven for the world title is underway and they're freaking out backstage. We know this now about time running out. You can tell Raven totally rushed that entrance. Tell me Erry Funk dead on the canvas. Chance of Terry. Raven has a chair fed to him from outside one of the three matches his career, and look at that. Yeah, forgot an the laceration prop toe holding Funky's to the seats. Raven has folded out a chair. Tommy Dramers just mentioned there comments very deep in contemplation as he watches his mentor get battered by the EC Government champion. Raven. Oh, clearly a big cut. He's on a Funker's head. No, it's all faced, doing the full squeeze. Don't worry, honey. Yeah, yeah, it's not real blood. That's exactly you. You know, I chewed on a blood capsule and it went all over, you know, I took a bottle to catch up in the ring and then look at him, forced out, blood out. We look going to look how hard he's working. He's worked Jesus. He bladed right near his eye. Raven laying the boots and a funk looks like a fucking they've got shot in the head. Yeah, they're sending the doctors in here to shoot brother. And they can tell that Tommy Dreamer's risen at the announced position. They're chanting Tommy and pointing towards the crow's nest. Tom you can't just stand by and watch to Terry Funk take this level of abuse. I'll look at fucking Raven trying to me. Jake Roberts in the corner, idiot, He's got it through by himself, pulling up on the corner. There, you got to do it by himself, Tommy Dreamer says, but Terry Funks looks like a sitting duck shooting duck. Really, yeah, Kip keeps going this way, Raven in his face, peppering the cut with right hands, Raven just measuring carry Funk. Come on, here's the screen from. Funk comes up, swinging as only he can, slinging blindly and wildly at the World Heavyweight champion. But quite Frank Funk knows how to play in peril. Boss, Yes he does, no question Bravan sending up a table at ringside. Harry Funk is just it comes doctor doctor Allen again. Get him out of the ring. Terry ain't going out like that. You've got to consider it the man's well being. He's got a wife, he's got a family. Funking dragged out of the ring a bloody corpse. What good is the world heavyweight titles? You're crippling wife, Joe. You're not an athlete. I don't mean you're not an athlete. You don't understand what he means to Terry table from underneath the ring. It was a little broken part of the leg on the other way, having a hell of a time with the furnitures. Raven so lopsided. Look at him, Yeah, just trying to figure out it doesn't fit Terry. He can lay Terry on top of it and get his bump in. Here comes Raven. It's the ropes, full steam, vaults the ropes. It crashes on top of Terry. We're the table. Look at that fucking slice and has to and you can see the restaurans. Go home, go home, see next pay review. Tell him I said to go home. Wow, Raven, that's Haim in the back. I'm beyond the mat. Tell him I tell him to go. Tell him that I said. Going on here, Joe thirty five seconds, hold on coming out here. That's Reggie Bennett. Reggie Bennett. I forgot about these people. Is Reggie Bennette Bennette block style. She just smacked funk across the back of the chair. She tries to pile drive and it doesn't go too well. Oh my god, Funk goes up like a power bomb. And she was thinking, pile driver. Can tell therese all these runnings and were supposed to take their time, and yeah, Raven's nest, Raven's nest. But Joe, if they think they're gonna bring Terry over here and choke slaming him like a Phlosper stun steady as with the mic us come back his career and it's gonna be right in front of your feet, and Dreamer drops the head set. He's not gonna stand by. How are you gonna get down remembers of Raven's nest stand up table? You're gonna jump us Raven and Dreamer definitely. Uh what dream match we all want to Yeah, there's the longest standing feud in EISs w oh uh oh. Big Dick Dudley appears on the on the uh stage and drops for Reamer. Anybody put your hand up to go through three tables tonight, he died, I'll do it, He died, I want to edd and volunteered for table justice. This isn't a turn, by the way, Yeah, Big Dick Dudley, they're setting at the tables, Dreamers ready and here we go. Do you let it look up? He goes, don't kick to the balls. There comes Big Dick Dudley off the stage. Oh fucking house. Is that is that? Is that a choke slam? Or was that a Is that a suicide? Drop? Listen to these people? No, it's their fists in the air box. Oh my god. Like this is like anarchy. Anarchy rules and you see up man. I guess, like I feel like it's a bad thing to say. That's not that bad. I guess I feel racism, racism running wild in this fucking running That's what I feel. It's South Philly. I mean, it's not like this is a a ninety eight percent white air that's for sure. Yes, yeah, that is true. I didn't know. Just so, Tommy hits the ring, not standing another second. This whip with the ropes hiptoss a tept by Raven. It's countered by the DDT of Dreamer, refereed, been ddted earlier by Raven, so there's no official to see it. Funk begins to stir. He's bloody. The crowd realizes it's coming. He covers, He covers, this is a big fuck up here too. He ki out, but they rang the bell back up, freaking out about how much time they have left. Knee left Funk inside tradle here, it is there. It is only Terry Fun his dream w Hunker and the crowd Tommy Hoist to the title bloody. I feel like only Terry Fun could be someone who fights a h gargashauan bloodbath, the violent fight and whims with a small package, you know, the way dance the Sandman and Big Stevie come out. Cam Riven fresh from the locker room, had a bloody broken feet and tap embrace between Funking Dreamer has the allies that they don't have to race against time anymore. There impossible. Here's the new the we do that heavyweight champing this Funker with a big embrace for the hat guy. That's a good moment for him, the access celebrating with the people getting blood all over them. Oh god, oh my god. Well quite a way to go off the air for the Funker and he is now the e CW World champion. Yeah, the business has been done. And here's his thoughts watching this back in the commentary chair with very blasting what was going through mind? And were worried about We're worried about getting her? Is it primarily entertaining the fans as the primary It wasn't you know? That's that's so funny. Is because I knew that I was going to do some things in the ring that were extremely dangerous. Now, before the match, your wife asked you not to do a certain move, which you wound up doing, yes, Which was a little while, And it wasn't really lying to her whenever I said I wouldn't do it. I just didn't want her to know about it and worry about it, you know. And I didn't want her to know what I was going to do and worry about what I was willing to do in the ring, you know. And and again I do these things. I say, I can't worry, and I know that there's a possibility of being hurt doing them, and yet I still do them. And I don't know if that's it. I don't know if that's a sickness or what it is. You know. Again, the one thing that I want to do, and I think Cactus is this way. And I think and we're not the only two restlers that are this way. There's many of them in the sport. It this way. There's a move right there that that was just something that was a heck of a move right there, that was extremely dangerous right there, and we do it for the for the fans benefit, you know, and e c W was the initiator of the high risk they're really truly high risk maneuvers. And why it was the initiator of the high risk maneuvers is because ECW had to be different. They didn't have been million dollars for production. All we had is the little arena and all we had is the wrestler's performances in the ring, and that was was so essential to us, and we knew that, and we knew in order to exist that we had to be different and go beyond what all other professional wrestling was offering them at that time. And it was successful. It was successful, and it's still there and it's still being successful and will continue to be successful and will continue to grow as long as that fat ass is still running things. That being Paul Hayman as he's exasperated on beyond the mat, exhausted having been tough. Two seconds after, you know, the popular lore is that seconds after the pay per view went off the air, that power the building was lost. I think it was actually a backup generator that failed, and so there was you know, legendary lore about that. But you can tell when Paul is being interviewed backstage after the pay per view by Barry Bloustein that there's plenty of lights on and everything. It's not really a problem. But yeah, this night went down in history as Funk bloodied with the championship was walking through the front row of these ZCW faithful that really we saw in some cases John Oates, the straw hat guy. We saw him back when you know, Funk was wrestling Eddie Gilbert in Eastern Championship Wrestling before anybody knew to give a shit, and there was an embrace between the two and in Scott William's book Hardcore History, The Extremely Unauthorized Story of VCW, Bailey says he came right into the crowd and said we did it. We did it, and actually made me cry, and it almost makes me cry to think about it now. We caught a little bit of the aftermath of the matchup because they get right on Terry Funk, and this is such an enduring image to me of Funk. He keeps coughing because he has like blood in his throat, I think, and he's coughing, and he's coughing. He's sitting in a chair and attending to him full. You know the scene I'm talking about. Yes, I do know, having just been you know, taking his body to places that someone of his age never can go. So I can't imagine kind of like the shock his body is is dealing with at the time, and with you know, a taped forehead and coughing horribly. Yeah, he takes a big old swig of beer out of a brown glass bottle. Oh where are you, wander legend? So this is the movie taking through the whole. He has knee injuries and knack injuries, and I have confidence that he knows what he's doing. But it's still hard after all these shows. Just who I'm getting hurt? Man teasing control, But it's pretty scary. You could tell him if I said the girl looked them they lived at holdings. Get even out? Oh good, just depicting people backstairs for long time? I understand. Where's a finish? Until I thinks on the still kicking ass, you have anything, any steps from the military, you feel like I have anything? Long bumping up anything on that, I think it just down nothing I just went down, you know, or anything? Let me get us I need to step step on and the snow as long as how it go for me, I'm just glad it's over. If they liked it, I liked it all right. If the crew like it, I like it, how to go, I'm just happy it's old. I don't know. I'm proud of my guys what we did it. I've never traded it for anything. You want to play my and so it's all the way back to seventy five. In a lot of ways, it's Terry Funk as defending world champion, though on a much smaller scale here in ECW. But there are towns to make, there are opponents to make, and before he loses the title in relatively short order, that summer to Saboo and the barbed wire match that I know we've covered before, Boss Oh yes, And if you think you're getting out of watching that one again, you'd Funk makes several dates, including May second at Asbury Park, redefends the title against Stevie Richards, telling you sort of how much plans there still were for Big Stevie Cool coming off barely legal. Then they moved to Trenton, where he defends against Devon Dudley successfully New York City at the Lost Battalion Hall on May eighth of nineteen ninety seven, where hedefeats Raven in a rematch in just four minutes. This all according to Wrestling Data. Then there was a show called DCW Barely Legal Chapter two on May the tenth at the Arena where Funk beats Big Stevie Cool and Raven and the Sandman in a four way to retain the championship. Sarahcuse. May sixteenth, he defeats Raven in another rematch for the title. Buffalo Invasion on May seventeenth and Buffalo, New York. Of course, there's a tag match where Raven and Big Stevie Cool team up to beat Tommy Dreamer and Terry Funk. They come back in the Buffalo Invasion May seventeenth for Terry Funk to retain against Big Stevie Cool and Raven and the Sandman and yet another four way dance Jesus Christ oh, I imagine at least two per match. A twenty fourth at the Golden Dome in Monica, Pennsylvania, he defeats Big Stevie Cool one on one to retain the title back in Monica August second, nineteen ninety seven, defeating Shane Douglas of course, in Douglas's backyard to retain the championship. Warwick, Pennsylvania. August eighth, ninety seven, Terry Funk defeats Sabou before the Born to Be Wired show, which was the next night, August ninth, nineteen ninety seven at the Arena, And as we've talked about in the archives, it's available now as part of the the Hopper Shows. Sabo defeats Terry Funk that night to become EASYW champion, just one week before ECW's sophomore pay per view effort. And I keep calling it heat Wave, and that's an error. Heat Wave was the August ninety eight pay per view, but in fact, the second ECW pay per view in August of nineteenninety seven was hardcore Heaven heat Wave in the regular arena show earlier in the summer. I know you were concerned about me getting that wrong. I totally was. I was, I I wasn't sure and I'm just I'll tell you, I feel like a weight's just been lifted off my And as we talked about, according to Sabu's book, the title change in the barbed wire match was not the plan. The idea was for Funk to go into the second pay per view that won in the first one in defense of the championship, but because of the nature of how Funk found himself entangled in the barbed wire, the audible was called that it just wouldn't be safe to essentially continue the match such that Terry Funk would be able to get on top of Sabu and pin him. We saw back in the Public Enemy tag match with Dory and e CW how Terry Funk likes to make it a practice of wrapping himself in barbed wire. Boss Yeah. So Szabu wins the championship, they go to the pay per view and on that show in Fort Lauderdale, Shane Douglas reclaims the ECW World Championship, defeating Sabu and Terry Funk in a rematch the first rematch of the famed nineteen ninety four three way dance at the night the line was crossed that we started the ECW leg of the lapsed Funk talking about and of course Raven and Stevie Richards is mentioned. By the summer of nineteen ninety seven are off to WCW to form Raven's flock, so they were crossing the line before TNA. They were crossing the line before t and am I'm positive that's where they got it from. Maybe they didn't know that that's where they got it from, but I would imagine that's the case. Must have been someone's for the night all line was cross on a s home forell fucking I'll tell you he ain't wrong, And yeah, I get right whether it's a line worth crossing as I suppose what historians will decide. And it wasn't without milestones that that short lived title reign from Terry Funk, which while he had held the UCW World title before back in the Eastern Championship Wrestling days, it was hardly a circuit doing frequent enough cards that you would consider it a real world title run with a lot of, you know, appreciable number of title defenses like in his imity A title days. It was pretty much just won the belt and lost it in like the next show they did. I mean that's not exactly true. I think he successfully retained it against Shane Douglas once, but for the most part, not much to say about that rang. So this is pretty much the second world title run that Terry Funk ever had and in addition, during that first ECW tynanraign, he's also worked in Smoky Mountain Wrestling. He's taking all kinds of indie dates across the northeast of the United States, so he's hardly you know, mister ECW at this point was here as far as American wrestling goes. He's exclusive to ECW, though he is making dates forum the FMW in Japan. But during the course of that litany of shows, that August second show in Monica, Pennsylvania, according to Scott William's book in the History of VCW, it was a milestone. It was ECW's first ever crowd of two thousand fans to see the Funker come out and others, I'm sure August second at the Golden Dome to see Terry Funk defeat the aforementioned hometown guy, Shane Douglas. Douglas has talked about how this Golden Dome building was one that he was really pushing for ECW to run because he felt like they could do a really good crowd there and it was kind of a it was a tough sell, and he talked about how anxiety written Paul Hayman seemed to be about being able to rise to the occasion of an actual multi thousand seat building, even in nineteen ninety seven. It's easy to forget just how comfortable Paul Hayman was with ECW at the scale that it was upon the first early legal total totally agree, it's to forget. There wasn't a whole lot of ambition to do bigger and bigger buildings like AW. You know, there was absolutely no interest in doing the major arenas in any major cities, and it was they even went very trepidaciously into Florida and you know, much further down in the East Coast that you know, the southeast of the United States. There were so many more costs involved. There were so many guys that used to make the towns driving like Mick Foley would drive over from Long Island. You had to fly the Funker in of course, but other than that, most guys were Philly and New York based, New Jersey based, some in Connecticut, some a little further down, some a little further up. But for the most part you didn't really have to worry about plane transportation and all the hotel costs and everything. So it really was something that they didn't really relish in the front office taking a risk like a multi thousand seat building, But that that Golden Dome show pretty much stands. I mean, there was an Anarchy Rules pay per view in Chicago in nineteen ninety nine that I think did around five thousand, which was the all time ECW tenants record, And they never really went to buildings that would allow them to draw more than that anyway, to really see if they really built a supercard how much they could draw. But there it is. The Funker can put that one in his hat as one of the biggest attendance is in ECW history. So it mentioned Shane Douglas wins the title in the second pay per view and in the Hardcore History book, Douglas says, I don't think the fans would have accepted anyone else. No, this is the Funker speaking about Shane Douglas moon the titling on the show. I don't think the fans would have accepted anyone else at that point. Shane fit that mold perfectly. He was the franchise, he lived the franchise. Sabou had become champion eight days earlier, defeeding Funk in the Barbar match and so we must watch it, We must watch it. He was the franchise, He lived the franchise. Yes he was. He was a franchise e with twenty three box locations across the American Northeast, and he was taking care of fran scenes. That's right. He would pay the central office, the McDonald's central office, to use the branding on a licensing base. But for all intents and purposes, he was a franchisee. Wouldn't that have changed the whole gam if instead of the franchise, he just a franchise e, a guy opening a fucking Jersey mics at the strip mill down the street. That would have been tremendous coming in like having a meeting with a guy selling the newest point of sale system. See what's great about this is not only do you have your delivery in the same platform, but you can tip your workers as well. In fact, we all were rolling out something called early payroll, where for some reason, you buy this tablet so you can pay people two days earlier. Like, okay, fucking great. I mean, tell me more about your revolutions, your evolutions, your innovations. I'm a franchise it's apparent get disc thirty Ready, get disc thirty Ready, disc disc thirty brother. That was an ECW noise. If I've ever heard one fire up these videos and it's just like you, it's just fucking I mean, it's like it's just rabid. Yes, it's it's hungry, you know, addicted. You know, you know what they you know what they remind you know what ECW fans remind me of. They remind me of. Do you remember when we watched and I'm sure you've watched anyway, but in in Me and Jones the Temple of Doom where they're putting that first guy down into the lava pit and everyone is just like got these extremely crazy ass glassy eyed glares, and then that's e c W right there. Okay, e c W. Is the cult of Collie? Well, it's better than the cult of personality that I'll give you that, like the what we're gonna say, a Punjabi prison match. The cult of Collie, like to me, is full of people that at work, in their in their jobs and their personal lives at home, they're kind of quiet and reserved, and nobody in their social circles thinks of them as like wild or crazy or bloodthirsty. And then they go to the ECW show and they they they reveal their true selves. They reveal the heart of darkness. Yes, yes, they reveal like basically a masochism. Yes, right, that beats just under the surface. This this interest in watching car crash videos. I mean I also think too, this is this is the best part of their month. Oh, no, question, Like there's nothing else, Like they just they count down the seconds from when they get home from one of these shows to the next one. Because I mean, they were black T shirt wearing gamers. But you got to realize there was no stream, right, you couldn't pretend to have a social life gaming all day. Back then you had to acknowledge that you were a shut in because you couldn't stop gaming. Whereas now you can pretend that you know, you have a community and kind you have a job. You have a job, and you know, right, yeah, right exactly. You're getting tips, people are giving you money on Patreon. I've gotta stop going down this road. I got a tip for you. Pretty soon. I'm gonna smash the nearest mirror. Okay, so we're gonna watch it. We of course reviewed it in the archives format, but we didn't give our live as it happened reactions to really one of the most brutal wrestling matches of the nineties and certainly one of the most brutal matches on American soil. It's August ninth, nineteen ninety seven the ECW Arena. It's Born to be Wired, as the show came to be called, Saboo Versus Terry Funk replace the ropes with strands of wire. I think this is the first time they did it in the arena since the Public Enemy Dorian Terry match wore earlier on the lapsed Funk. I remember seeing a Cactus versus Sandman barbed wire and match, I think on a home video from Florida, a show they did down there. But for the most part, that's the only only one I can think of, and this one is hillacious if you want all the gory detail as far as what the wrestlers unbelected about this night and the damage it caused to them. And just a horrific tear to the bicep. I mean, I mean a slice, not a bicep tear, I mean a slice slice right, Sabu cut his arm open so badly in this barbed wire that he could see the muscle, but there was no blood. It was just it was there was just too It was just fucking is what it was, right exactly. He was butchered in the arena because because when you go on a barbier match, you can't wear a T shirt. I don't know if you knew that. Yeah, Funker didn't get that memo. But Sabu took flight into the wire with a bare chest, no idea how he's going to land, no idea what angle the wire is going to hit him at, and uh, he's got the scars to this day to prove it. So this is another part of why Terry Funk and ECW was such a legendary thing, because he went out there at his age and did shit like this. Even after headlining their first pay per view and leading them to some perceived promised land, the Funker still isn't satisfied. The Funker still thinks that people want to see sacrifice from Terry Funk and he's going to give it to them. Let's hi. Play in three is just part of the beginning. Oh I'm so sorry. One zero three thirty five one zero one zero three thirty five yeah, one O three thirty five, oh, three thirty five. Here we are three to one A play very what they're here for? M h Look at that barbed wire, boss, This is not he had stuff. I mean, that's not I mean right, that's not fucking you know that little thin ass chicken wire They sometimes that's like, that's uh, penitentiary quality, penitentiary grade barbed wire. The fans are on their feet for Jerry Funk, referee runway he Wee Moore, who has the unfortunate I'm how you feeling. I mean, it's just it's grotesque already. I mean it's grotesque seeing that ring like that, and and the fact that, like I mean that these guys are have been removed and more or less okay with this, like they're like, let's do this. Sorry, could you repeat that? I said, It's it's grotesque, not just because of the barbed wire and what's gonna come, but in the fact that these guys are more or less okay to do this. Oh yeah, they're game, and they have experience doing these matches in Japan and I didn't. But I never understood and we talked a lot about this when covered the show. I'd understood. Why you do it match this kind of intense and severe and out of the ordinary a week before pay per view? Like, what's the point of putting these guys at this risk before you do an actual live show that matters. I mean, do this match, but do it, you know in seven months when you need it drop a right. It's almost like they tucked it in knowing that they wouldn't be able to get it in as anticipated, right man, And they might not have been able to fucking get anyone to I mean did they Maybe they was there, it's the canvas and rolls underneath, pointing to his brain like too smart for that? Said, that's right, brother, Brother, Brother, what I watched the bar wire? That's just crazy stuff. Hey, there's a moment, brother, there was a moment, dude, we were you pointing to your head to kind of show how intelligent you were? Why are you shooting on me? Brother? But you're trying to say you're the more integ intelligent terry. I was just I mean, are you the are you? Are you the terry intelligence? Dude? What's going on? Brother? And by the way, dude, what's that Boo's real name? Anyway? Are you? Why are you keeping secrets from why are there two other terries in the ring? Why they're brother Who's who's the real terry? Right? You know, you know if they if they all live to New York, they should all live in Terrytown. Jown's been our fucking podcast feed for the left Pass four months past, four months past, whole fucking year. Oh yeah, that's true. If you want to go all Terry's Hanging's news neck Breaker and a big pile driver spiked Saboo, you got to give funk Or credit. He's not looking to go to that barbed wire unless he has to. He's looking to pin Saboo right out of the gate. He probably knows he's going to get tangled up in it. He knows that he knows that he's going to get wrapped up in it, and that he's not gonna be able to get out, because it's just it's just the way that he is. That's the way the reason he was put on planet Earth. Right, what's he get? Any developer get enveloped by barbed wire. They both have their hands covered in you know, tape, and they're snatching the barbed wire to prevent themselves from going into it. Protected by the tape. But there's something so gnarly to meet boss about barbed wire sticking in to athletic. I mean, it's just gonna rip off anyway. Oh fucking Christ. It's like you ever you ever go out in the woods and you get those spurs whatever those things are that like they come off. Yeah, there it is. Oh Sabo with hrkan Rana one two Funk kicks out and when he does, he sends Saboo side first, bare chest rib first into the wire. Oh it's gross. They sent Bill Alfonso and others to local arts to buy the barbed wire, and there's actually a logistical problems for getting the barbed wire that they wanted, which I think would have been a bit safer than what they ended up having to string at the last minute. Again, all that color in the archives, but for the for our purposes here were just leach the historical nature of this match, and just the fact that Terry Funk yelling at the yelling at the fans there that fucking little he looks like somebody from the movie is open himself up. Ah, that's a famous shot. Sab Irish whipped and takes the barbed wire across the back of the shoulders, just like you would a regular set of ropes. And you don't find out till it's too late if this is the kind of wire that's going to cooperate. Boss, I can't go gentle into that night. You must lunge yourself into the wire for the U cub faithful. And now he's Taboo is crouched on the wire. Watch his pants, those baggy pants. Look at and how they're stuck. Look at him, Boss, I mean it's like, come on right up his fucking crotch. Look at him. He can't he can't pull his leg over the wire. Well, it's sticking to the wire, bunkers ripping the other leg off. That's one thing about those pants Saba used to wear, fucking custom made for dramatic effect. When barbed wire matches a bunker down, whip Saboo again and he takes the wire across the back. Oh, that one's nipped. The look you can tell you that's the one. That's the one, isn't it. No? The one is when he does air Sabo like the poetry in motion, flying like I saw it. I want to see it again. Fuck me, it's a good little gash under the armpit there like not okay, bunk are going to work with the jabs now turning on the box in Like I would just not. I'd be like, you know what, I'm gonna quit. I don't. I'll get another job someplace else. They're on their feet and they haven't sat down at least, I mean, what do they like? They just want to see blood and carnage. It's just like there's no like I guess like the it's real guys like this is this is real? Like guess you know, they know how to bump, they know how to like take shit, but like when you get when you get shredded by barbed wire, it's flesh being cut like this, Like, I mean, did they calculate the potential risk for this? I mean I know that you said they had experience, but oh uh, I don't know. I don't know what calculating the risk looks like, because if you calculate the risk, you don't do it right. I mean, was there was there ever a fear that, you know, maybe one of these guys is gonna die? You know? I think that's the big story of ECW is they walked up to that line so many times that you have to tell yourself that somewhere in the deepest recesses of Polly's mind, they were ready for that. I mean, for fucking I mean bo, not Polly's mind as much as the performers. A lot of times they're not there. They had, not even knowing what they're going to do. I mean, you need to fill out the body of the match. He like, you know, I mean, fucking Tommy Dreamer wanted to get shot. It's nineteen ninety seven, and after all, we've seen Terry Funk do across the world in professional wrestling. He was just Irish whipped by Saboo into barbed wire ropes and now he's age and he's hanging, and now he's resting on it. That was a that was a choice, a conscious choice to rest on the barbed wire. Oh now it's getting fucking I can't watch this ship. I can't. He's raking. It's a barb, a barb of the wire on the Funker's forehead. Yeah, you know what, he should have asked Vicky to change her name to Barb. Bunker's getting color. Yeah, yeah, it was just Sheik's four because uncle's fur is his own Spike. Oh fucking Christ almighty, this is show you this one. Let me tell you this. This might even be too bad for my mom. Yeah, we don't want to use her. This might be too much for her. She might. I mean, look at him tied up in the wire, the funker, his age, Look at him. The thing is, I can't if I get queasy watching it. She's gonna fucking pass out their saboo and that's word. It's funny, you know, just like every fucking thing. That's the one. No oh, he does it again later? All right, he's he's good, he's good. This isn't it yet? I didn't think so, so rolls funker over. It's two, all right? What came out like? It's always so funny they did? What? What ghoest? Like? Did you watch this when it happened? Like when you were you couldn't watch it live, but I watched it shortly after it came out on video? Yeah, I mean, what was your thing? There? It is? He got it. He just got it in the arm. Fuck he took off in the corner. He's freaking out. Look at his face. His eyes are wide through the bloodied face, and he's looking at Bill of fond so like, holy shit, I'm fucked. So what he's saying is, you know, I'm really cut bad, FONZI, go get your tape. Oh fucking Sabo tells the story of this. I don't have any tape, was a Jesus Christ s FONSI helped me out here, get some bape. There you go. He saw the bottom of your screen. Al Fonso be lined through the back, was holding his arm together. Okay, you want to picture like a you know, like an opening. Oh my god, fuck yeah. Okay, So like what was your when you saw this? When you because you wanted to watch this? When he came out of no you don't. I didn't. I didn't like it, No, like it didn't know. I felt like it was just too And he goes fucking kicks out into the fucking barbed wire. Jesus Christ. It's so fucking like, even the little hints of it you see it just fucking cringing. Cringe, cringe with that guy, like the guy with the band the Red White. These guys are thrilled. They're like, yes, they're watching intently. They want it. They're like, get cut more. Here. It is. It's the difference between people gather around when one's getting the shit beat out of him in the street, and instead of feeling a little bad for him and a little like someone should do something, they feel like, oh, ship, look at this, that's the mentality. Two chairs back to back, Like he can't even properly sell. He can't even properly sell because he's gotta fucking wrap his arm up and tape so doesn't fall apart. He's laughing, this fucking clown. You guys know what they're seeing. Yeah, well guess what. Yeah, of course not, because it's all entertainment, right, it's not real. That guy the Steelers Jersey looks pretty spooked. He looks like he's having fun. There was so much more intense and gory than the other barbier match we saw. Yeah, the other one, they were just you know, they were using the barbed wire. But it was like, I don't know if you heard me say this or not, but it looks like they got fucking like penitentiary grade barbered water. Yes, really, you know, it's not like like the little chicken wire ship that you that they had in the other one. This is like, yeah, you're right, this is real. This is meant to keep about fucking felons. It turns out that it failed to do that. Yeah, that's the beating on Sabo. Sabo goes under the wire, hits the floor, and keeps wrapping the arm turned by himself some time. Oh wonder how much use that left arm that's going to have. I just get to just kick out of in the middle of these intensely violent spectacle spots. They'd go for the cover and the guy would lift the shoulder. Yeah, I know, I know. It's like an ec W. There should have just been one pin attempt. Yeah, I've always been successful kick out twice a year. I mean like, it's also like, dude, why aren't you stopping the match and just going to get better? Like, why are you continuing with this ship? Gotta win the title but he's not supposed to yet happen ntil later you said, finish the match. Baby. That's the only thing pro wrestlers understand. I don't even remember you talking about that himself in UH when we did it. The fact that he that Terry was supposed to that's fine, that's Sabug's version. Oh now, funk are driving Alfons? Dragging Alfonso in from the apron over the top of the wire. You had another version of those fucking bizarre of Terry Funk. Yes, he's got the uh gord buster Sabu got first across the top of the wire. For the industry. This is for everything that E. C W was. This is just like he's got a fucking he's got a fucking he's got a fist full of barb. He does Barbara Goodish, It's a whole It's a whole side Alfonso's head. It's a whole whole new mean a fisting barb here? Ah fuck me? Sabo hung out to dry. Someone handed him tape while he's upside down with his stal Why is Funk ripping open Alfonso's shirt and raking why or across his bare back across I think how Fonda wants to do it. Alfonso just scream away, stop it, Oh colapsed, funk boss, We've come to a dark place. Funk Is. His whole shirt is stained with blood, it's tattered and not bleeding. What's his problem? I think that's probably what the Funker was saying when he was going to town with that wire across his back. Why won't you fucking bleed? Funds all I want you to do is have a little damn bit of color. He's going ahead and wire cutters on the barbed wires ahead and cut wire. I'm gonna wrap a motherfucker up fucking barbed wired burrito here coming out. He's the wire. Now he'shipping Sabo with it like like his hair, his hairt in the wire. Oh my god, look at Look at Sabo's hair in the wire. I see it. I see it as if someone was grabbing him by the hair and holding him by at the top of his head. Every move you make, you're in a new entanglement you didn't expect. You want to talk about claustrophobia. Make one move and get sliced. Make no moves and what die and get on the bike. No more, no more for this fucking gooon. Oh look at its back is sliced up and he's laying on that nasties c w arena floor. There's fucking common piss on it on the floor and exactly chee steaks and like onions from two years ago. So then cut away, cutaway wire entirely on different sides of the ring. I guess to establish means of egress in case of emergency. Here he goes again, shack on the stabbing ways. What's down, Terry Funk? So tell me again, what was it? So? Like you said this, Oh Jesus, Rob Van Dam Sabo's partner, like you said, it wasn't on pay per view, it was for you know, it was So what was the what was the show? I don't remember, Like what was the point of the show. I don't know, I mean, I really don't. I guess it was just to get a Funk Saboo barboire match in before they took the belt off Terry Funk. Because the pay per view the week after this he lost the title of Shane Douglas and the three way with Sabo Saboo turns around after this and makes the pay per view. See Rob Van Dams wearing gloves. He's uh, that's smart and dog. He obviously talked to crew crew guys backstage. I get some workman wrapping up. Then look at him. Look at Alphonso. What a lunatic. Sand can't even get the barbed wire untangled from the ring apron to to further wrap up the funker and it per plans. Yeah, so look at Terry. He is now a barbed wire Bush. Think of his age. You call him Barbara Bush. Yeah, you could think of his age. Think of his contributions, think of his business, think of his family. Of his family. Think at the banquet we watched or heard and look at fuck me completely unwrapped in barbed wire on a table on the floor. Sabo takes off with a leg drop from the ring and crashes the funker. Look at that medical guy there with the white hollow and the white gloves and what the fuck? He's like, why what I fucking sign up for? This is such fucking Tommy Dreamers hit their hit ring side got to keep pandamn at bay. So just think of that, like that that crash and that that blood curdling ah. You feel like you're in the middle of like that scene that could very easily spiral out of control. It has spiral out of control. Look at Terry Funk. This is the situation, the predictament he's in. He can't he just like take the fall because there's no way for him to get in position to not lose. But he kicks out here because he's a idiot. And then they try to do something where they can roll him over and I guess to another. Probably Sabo would miss this or something and go through the table. But as Funk tries to get turned over again, it's right around his neck. Look, he's like, I can I can't, I can't go ahead. Looks like he's it looks like he's paralyzed. Oh he's gonna do it. He's gonna do another round. Oh yeah, that's right, there's this one he forgot. He does it too. On the second leg drop through the table, Saboo wraps his own legs. I remember, remember, isn't there like a moment where everyone's fucking oh god? When he comes out there all too tied up and mess because he's about to add a whole other round a wire. Look at foss Jesus Christ, Like, what is wrong with these guys? Ah? Look at the ripping on Sabo's pants. Funk has nowhere to go. He's reaching around looking for a point where he can get free. Imagine crashing through the table with wire all over you, and you realize, like it's right up on your neck. Say, they're both trying to get up, but they're too tied to each other. Funk screening direction. I mean like it's like it's such a well. I mean, not only is this like a stupid idea from a humanity level, but it's also a stupid idea because I mean, look at fucking Bill Alfonso here, just sucking, you know, breaking k fade to get them free, yeah, and lifting them with his two hands in the trying the wire and ship like what a what a completely idiotic stupid This is where they call it. Huh. Yeah. The Funk ends up lifted into the ring, savas over him. He's hitting them. Oh my god, look at Funk's neck. Oh fuck, how compromised it is. It's like he's got it around his throat. It covers him. Funk kicks out. He's a idiot. Just accept the loss, your dumb, fucking prick. I can't. I couldn't do it. God, this is this is the c W. I want to do it for the fans. I got it. I went ahead and kicked out for the fans because I want to give them those stuff the show they deserve. Is absolutely in the bloodied state of the man. Sad just that kind of forces his shoulders down, covers him again to Funk moves his legs but can't get free. It's over and mercifully, you have a new E c W World heavyweight champion. Look at the funk. He can't extract himself. I also don't understand why is he not going for the the wire on around Funk's neck first? Why is it Alfonso? Yeah, well, k Fabe, you complained before, so now he's yeah, I was letting Funk bleed out. Yeah, but he cut fucking funk ship earlier. It's what a disaster. We have a new world heavyweight champion. I should be leaping at it my feet right now. I should. I should be screaming, oh my gosh, too heavyweight champion. Blood mixed with the wire, mixed with the torn clothing, mixed with the purple of Saboo, and and and more so Terry, Fuck Terry. It's a little something we like to call the lapte Boss fifties not still needs. I'll be okay if I never see this one again. Certainly at this point it is, I hope I'm making it. I'm making a call now. When Saboo dies, we're not doing a fucking journey for him, for who for Saboo? When Sabu dies, he doesn't get a fucking tribute. I can't wait to get to the part of the Lapsed Funk where we go through his deathmatch career. This one, huh bring his fields so great before e w All, this ship was so great. The Funk is all things to all people, all generations. Look at them, cut the wire close up shot of They don't teach you this in EMT school. Do they teach you this in wrestling school? Definitely not. I don't even think they teach you this in barbed wire schooled wire and using wire cutters to terry Funk. And you can't get that image of Sabos pulling pants out of my head. It's like the stretched Look at this. They have a globe of barbed wires and their heads yep, still working in the free of these two. It's been like five six, seven minutes. I don't know if they says, I know, I'm still seeing it on my monitor. But okay, John Television, I can't possibly imagine where this put it would ever be seen. Very still with it Television network trapped to his pants is able to at least extract himself from the fray. And that's that. Oh, what a nightmare lots on the Funker. I'll tell what Terry Funk has become. It's it's awful. It's awful. I can't I hate it, I really hate it. And wrestling fans have nice things. No, no, because because in the end, you don't want nice things. You just want you want you want you want someone to get do. You just want to see people get beat the fuck up and torn to shreds. It's a it's it's a shameful thing to be a wrestling fan. Shame. And with that, this iteration of Terry Funk's CCW run comes to a close because he heads to New York on a full time basis. Let's not forget he had done the Royal Rubble in nineteen ninety seven in San Antonio. Did he? Oh yeah, he was in that thirty mind, I don't remember that at all, the one that uh Steve Austin won. Let's see, he turned down ninety six as we talked about last week, but I guess the uh this was a short enough drive. Number twenty four was Terry Funk and the final five were Taker, Vader, Brett Diesel, and Stone Cold Diesel Glynn Jacobs. So yeah, he made it to the Rumble but didn't really do anything fuller time with them until we get to know the last few weeks of the year in nineteen ninety seven, and he debuts as Chainsaw Charlie as right talked about. We even did the addition of Monday Night Raw a couple of years ago that he debuts on. It was a December twenty seventh edition. And so he signs a couple of year contract with them and disappears from ECW for I would say a couple of years for the entirety of nineteen ninety eight until November, when at the November to Remember, which has become sort of like the landmark, Terry Funk does a big exit or return show. He comes back one more time for a very truncated run. It doesn't go anywhere, but we'll let Scott Williams tell the tale. Back at nineteen ninety eight November, but at nineteen ninety eights November to Remember, Funk would assume one of his most challenging roles, a truly hated heel in ECW. Could the man who exemplified ECW spirit in many ways get himself over as a despicable villain to that audience? Terry Funk was up for the challenge. He came out to Interruptjoey Styles opening, ranting about the slight he felt by not being picked as Tommy Dreamers tag partner. Dreamer had been having trouble with Jack Victory, and Funk appeared furious that Dreamer were turned to someone besides him for help. He ended up cursing at Dreamer and later attacking him, with Dreamer refusing to hit back the man who had been portrayed as his mentor. Unfortunately, the series of matches between Dreamer and the Funk are never materialized because Funk had that up hospitalized with hepatitis. Of course, I think one could say he went ahead and got hepatitizes. I went ahead and got heppatitis. I said, hey, hey, you know one thing I haven't tried yet. Hepatie, hepa hog tie hepatite? Does that come with a crunchy noodles? At the time, he recovered William's Rights, who, by the way, is the same author of Terry Funk's autobiography, The Angle had too much dust on it. Hepatitis laid me up for about three to four months. Funk said, it was just miserable. I could do things, but it took all my resilience and stamina from me, so he never really blew up the Tommy Dreamer match that has returned at the nineteen ninety eight November to Remember set up, and that would truly be the end of Terry Funk in the original ECW. The ECW that he came out to service an MC for their very first television taping and was apologetic to the audience by the time that taping was over for how crummy it had all been in his blazer Jesus to being called off the bench due to the provocations of Eddie Gilbert the chain match. He then finds himself enraptured in a TV title program with Jimmy Snooka, a world title program with Shane Douglas and Saboo. The three way dance happens, We're off to the races, and we end up with him in a blooded heap as we just saw in August of nineteen ninety seven. But there was one more sign of life to the idea of Terry Funk and ECW. There was one more way to leverage the unique dynamic and bond that Terry Funk created with this small, passionate rabbit fan base by killing himself in and around Philadelphia, because when WWE consolidated, bought WCW and then bought ECW's assets and bankruptcy court as ECW, let's just say, failed to failed to balance both sides of the ledger. After the aforementioned a nineteen ninety eight return of Terry Funk became ninety nine the TNN slot they get that they can't handle. People say that TNN was really only interested in doing a test run to see how WW would function on the network, And of course they took Raw from USA Network and dump DCW and ceremoniously and ECW declares bankruptcy. Paul Hayman walks out on an addition of Raw to do color commentary in two thousand and one, and it was only at that point that the true believers like Tommy Dreamer had to bow their heads and say, Yeah, this really is over. There really is no last ditch television station that we can sign to save our ass, There's no last ditch pot of money that we can desperately sink our hands into. It is over. And so with that, WWE becomes the controlling entity of all of ECW's intellectual property. The very idea of what Terry Funk was looking to to seed with his involvement and his sacrifice through the nineties now belonged to Vince McMahon anyway, mm hmm, with the whole animating force of the whole thing being this isn't the WWF, this isn't the WCW. Despite my stature in the industry, I Terry funkhim here because ECW is the last best hope to pertain a heart and a spirit of pro wrestling that I love that I associate with professional wrestling, and I'm going to keep it alive, and I'm going to bring a whole lot of younger kids along with me. And all that ends up happening, you know, despite tons of great memories being made, his checks bounce, drug addicts die, and bankruptcies are declared, and everyone scatters in their own respective directions. Most come, uh, come back to daddy, Terry. I just wanted you to remember one thing, brother, Nope, not wrong number, not you, Terry. I own you. I went ahead and got owned. I guess how's your toy? How's your horse? Why don't you look out the window and tell me how your horse is? Now Terry. Oh all right, Vince, I'll go ahead and go ahead and look out the window. Hey, my horse is dad, Yes it is. It's dead, and I'm gonna kill you too. Well. Damn you know, Terry, I bet you didn't know that you would always come back to work for me. I've been observing with great amusement or all the years you cutting a path for yourself, blazing a trail if you will, creating your own rasondetra if you will. I mean, I want to. I want to tell you this. See, when it comes to to to ownership of property, I don't always just go for the jugular right away. That's right. Sometimes I wait, I observe. I want to see how I want to see the ebb and flow with said property. I want to see where it's going, where it's been. And then when the moon is right, I strike and I pounce, and I take ownership not just of land property or or or or intellectual property. I take human property that's as well, and you are my human property. Terry. I want you to know that we've seen very very good success, surprising amount of success. Kudos to you and the whole squad there in ECW. We've seen great success with our DVD release, The Rise and Fall of ECW. This documentary has exceeded all our expectations in terms of sales on DVD, and as a result, I've got a notion that maybe it's time to resurrect ECW. Maybe there is more there than I was giving it credit for before I owned it all of course, and now that I'm in a position to make one hundred percent of the profits, maybe it is time to take this this car for a test drive. And Terry, I want you to know that I'm going to be sending you a contract for the two thousand and five one Night Stand ECW paper. It's going to be a one night where we turned the reins over to the old crew with Polly at the head, and all your old buddies will get back together and we'll be at the Hammerstein and New York and really seek to reclaim the spirit of ECW here in two thousand and five. But I want you to know, Terry, that I know as well as you do that you're not going to take the offer. You're going to look at the contract and you're going to say, this is a bastardized version of what I sacrificed for mm hmm. This is a corporatized version of what I bled for in mounds and heaps of barbed wire and flames and ladders. And I want you to know, Terry, that after you make that decision, after you take that stand, you're going to come back to me the next year and you're going to sign that contract and the stand you took will end up meaning less than nothing, because to take it and go back on it is worse than never having taken it at all, Isn't that right, Terry Funk. So you go ahead, as they say, you go ahead and think that you've won, and maybe in your mind you can see you won the battle. But Vince Chickman always wins the war. No one wins pal until Vince wins. No. No one can catch the crumbs until I eat. And so it was we turn again to a poor History by Scott Williams. People close to Vince McMahon said he was blown away by what he saw the night of One Night Stand two thousand and five. Although he tried to put on a stoic front, one person said he thought it would be a nice show, and when it was over, the fans would leave happy. He was not expecting this outpouring of emotion or the kind of buzz around One night stand. The person, a w W employee who asked to remain anonymous, said that shock might have been part of the reason for ww' sudden dropping of all things e c W the night after the show. Now they're referring to two thousand and six, actually two e CW one night stands No. Five and No. Six. The person said, quote, I think he was kind of threatened by it, not in the sense that DCW was going to take over WWE, but in the sense that it was not something he could ultimately control. What you have to understand about Vince McMahon is that he has to have control. Mean, you don't even want to be in the same room with him when he sneezes, because he just gets furious. It drives him crazy. And if you ask him, Vince, why do you get so worked up over sneezing, he'll tell you the truth. He'll say, I fucking hate it because I can't control it. Wow. But the DVD did very well, and this is at a time when they had bought so many assets that they started rolling out. Oh my god, I remember this period of time, I mean golden age WW home video releases. When it comes to documentaries, yep, yep, and when it comes to just the just the the the ability to finally have access to w CW footage, to w CW, to any footage really that just was kind of lost a time that you know, you never really were able to see again, and to it just was on unreal. It was an incredible time. Yeah, every release they came out with it just seemed to be so full of things that just like you said, you assumed you'd never be able to see again unless you know, dug out an old tape. I mean, I guess eBay existed, but it was not nearly as easy to find downloads of the shows. You remember, YouTube didn't exist for most of this, and they were putting together wonderful three plus hour documentaries yep, with all this footage they had and all the people that they now had sort of access to to sit down for interviews, and they did an incredible job recapping the history and the story and the heart and soul of ECW. And as they would do, they came out with some merchandise around the DVD release, and these ECW t shirts were flying. Whatever Vince told himself about ECW ceiling, it turned out to be higher than WCW's I repeat, it turned out to be higher than WCW's when it came to reinvigoration value, when it came to the value of the asset. Five years after the doors closed, more people were willing to spend more money on ECW than they were on WCW. And I'm not here to suggest that a similar attempt was made in two thousand and five to resurrect WCW and sell tickets to WCW shows. But I think we saw what happened in two thousand and one, for better or for worse. Yeah, they had to pivot and make it a WCWECW invasion by the summer because of how little confidence just a wcwplay aroused in the ww brain trust. Now that might be blinders on, that might be you know, bias and almost certaal he is. But you know what, you also have to think, would any WCW fan that only like WCW go to a WWNWCW howse show? I don't think so. Yeah, I'm probably not the ECW, though there seemed to be this happy balance that could be struck. There seemed to be this We've got Paul working for us. We've got so many of the guys that defined ECW in our orbit capable of bringing them in that it's not like another prominent Number two was lock those guys up in contracts. They're available if we want to make a play for him. We've got Mick Foley. Of course, Tommy Dreamer was around sort of like in an agent capacity and a wrestler capacity as well. Got everything we need, all the pieces. Joey Styles came to work for them, yep, yep, and so let's just do it. It was a time when they were coming off the Batista Triple H feud, but really the last real true drawing feud they did until Rock Sena. It really was like, we got to find something else going into the summer doldrums here, we got to find something else fresh, and they just do this one night standout idea out there and it was a fucking smash hit, playing off the signals they got from the home video sales on the ECW documentary that there was still a deep interest in revisiting that whole period of time that whole moment and time. Yeah, And it was summer of two thousand and five that they booked the Hammersteine, one of vcw's signature buildings, not the arena per se, but definitely one of their signature buildings, and booked one night stand and invited all the crew back, let Paul Hayman book the entire show, hands off. They did have ww wrestlers go there really just to build heat. There was that incredibly mimorable thing where Hayman's in the rings screaming at jbl Up in the balcony making fun of his bullshit, basically with alive. Mike Taz was there working for them, and he did a run in with a towel over his head again which got a huge pop. It was a great night, It was incredible pay per view, and the Funker was missing. And the Funker was missing because on that same summer, Shane Douglas, who was obviously personed on Grada WW I'm not even sure his phone, rang for one night's stand and definitely didn't leave on the kind of terms that would bring him back with open arms. And he actually was reached out to during the Attitude era, but chose WCW in two thousand to come back to because the offer WCW put on the table was much more lucrative than what WWF was offering him, so he turned him down again in ninety eight. Fuck this guy, right. So Douglas is finding himself still with you know, pretty good connections in the Pennsylvania indie scene, several companies like XPW, MLW three, PW, and two or three others. You know, we've talked of course about CZW ran the ECW arena and tried to you know, kind of keep that flame lit a bit still try to draw some houses in the signature ECW buildings, including the arena. So it's not like wrestling completely stopped running in that area and that the signals were no longer being sent about interest levels in these buildings in the years between ECW closing and ww resurrecting ECW. So Shane Douglass is to you know what, I've got access to Sabu, I've got access to Terry Funk, I've got access to myself, one of the top guys in ECW. I've got access to the ECW arena and enough guys from the glory days that we can put together our own and this will be this will be the one that is the authentic ECW union. This will be the one that's not brought to you by Vince McMahon. This will be the one not brought to you by the guy who sought to trample ECW when it existed, and not aggressively, not as aggressively as he may have tried against WCW, but certainly not somebody who was going to shed a tear when ECW hit the financial skids, And so he puts on his own show. It's called Hardcore Homecoming and it comes out in association with the release of a documentary, Forever Hardcore, which was another take on you Know WW did one. This one was produced by Jeremy Borash who got pretty involved along with his ex WCW alumni Bob Ryder, and not only TNA, but also this this outfit. This predated the Hardcore Justice ECW Reunion show in twenty ten and TNA that we had so much fun with during TNH God, you know how successful that was and how wonderful it was to see you know, hul Cogan crack a beer with the Sandman and see Dixie Arder talk about how these extremists just inspired her so so much. Yes, and to see Tom Dreamer cry about it such a fucking money television no matter which way you slice it, and so about extremities. So it was the battle of ECW reunion shows in the summer of two thousand and five, and Terry Funk had a decision to make and he picked the Shane Douglas show. He picked the show at the ECW arena. He picked the show that Vince McMahon didn't have his fingers in m and the Forever Hardcore documentary, which is a very nice piece they did but they could in terms of not having access to footage and all of that, but they did hit a lot of the high points of what ECW was all about and what Beating Heart was still there in that arena. It included a very nice compilation of many of the voices. That's sad for the documentary crystallizing what Terry Funk in particular meant to ECW. Terry Funk bodies ECW. Everything that was good about ECW was Terry Funk. I don't think I've met anyone who has a bigger passion for the business. That's not fair he's a great guy. He's a super great guy. Good friend of my family and good friend of mine. A lot of respect between you. Yeah, super milk. The guy's been there, done it all, still doing it, and I have all the respect in the world for that guy. He's just he's amazing, absolutely amazing. I'm glad you asked me about Terry Funk. Funk will just sit there and you go to the ring and afterwards you have to decipher yourself. Okay, tonight he kept throwing me out of the ring for some rewarded Oh okay. So it was a very different way of teaching. Hardcore fans absolutely adored Terry Funk because of him giving his body to them. Terry was way ahead of his time, and he stayed about ten years ahead of the curve his whole career. And its sixty something with these that shouldn't work at all at a back that is completely wrecked, but an iron will, he still goes out and entertains as good as anybody. He went to ECW and he didn't come there just to make himself a start. He came to put other people over. And how many legends put people over, I mean most guys. You know they want to be the top guy till the day they dropped, and Terry never cared about that. Terry, he was always good for business. Crazy that that can't be an act. That can't be an act. It's either the greatest work in the business or that man is the little nuts. Terry Funk. I wouldn't have stakes with him, but I love him to death. Yeah, he's been around at business. It's in nineteen oh two, and Terry Funk paid the way for a lot of guys in his business right now, and I respect him to the utmost reason why he started moon salting. He's getting he's getting laid on in his career. What the hell can I do, kid to really make these people pop that they ain't seen already? God, damn it, I'm going to mood So I went. I just looked down like that. He's like, what you don't think I can? I said, Terry, you are God, you can do. What am I gonna tell Terry Funck? Now you can't mood salt? The guy would have beat the hell out of me right then. I really admired John Eyres as football player because he taught me what a leader really is, you know, I mean kind of made me understand what a true leader is, and a true leader is a person to be followed, and I tried to do that whenever I was in ECWS, to be the type of individual that went out there and gave one hundred percent and didn't bitch and didn't dripe, and did the right thing for the company and tried to do the right thing for the people that I were in was in a ring with too, and I think that I accomplished it, and I'm very proud of that. And so Shane Douglas made the decision to headline the Hardcore home Coming two thousand and five ECW reunion show with yet another reprise of the Three Way Dance all these years later with T shirts on Shane Douglas Terry Funkin Sabou since nineteen ninety four. This match is set in the memory of VCW fans. It took place again in a barb wire match, of course, in the main event of the two thousand and five Hardcore Homecoming event. It was not Shane Douglas's first choice. He said the thought crossed his mind as a fitting match to put on the show, but really didn't think that the pieces were there to make it a successful match. He had other thoughts about maybe matching up some other guys, but ultimately but ultimately decided to go for it. In a shooting interview with our video, he remembers October remember four a tentative booking out of the show and they first conceived of the idea of the whole event, and he said the three way dance did enter his mind for about a split second, but then he stayed away from it because he didn't think we could live up to that legacy. And we said, the fans are looking back at that match, have it set up on such a pedestal that I didn't think we could live up to it. And I originally had him that's Terry Funk versus Sandman Me, Shane Douglas versus Raven and Sabu versus somebody else, but Todd Gordon included several people Todd Gordon included came back and said you're missing this man. It's have the chance to do the original three way dance. And so Shane Douglas was swayed and booked the match. But he felt, you know, that old time pressure in his gut and in the interview which he did the night before the pay per view. Before the event, I should say, he admitted that we have a task ahead of us tomorrow. He's sitting next to Terry Funk for this interview, and he said it was the same kind of pressure we used to feel ten years ago, and we better have a great one this week. Because we had a great match last a great sholl last week. We better have a great one this week. That same kind of pressure for the hardcore homecoming making him nervous, but it's also making him excited. Sure, that's the true ECW feel. And the documentary you Know, which was released to coincide with the event and sort of a hype piece for the event, did feature Terry Funk trying to crystallize and make the case for the historic nature of that three way dance and what the rematch means. It was the creativity in the dance that began, and it was a wonderful dance. Well me that Max special is it was the first time in forever in professional wrestling in the US where you had a one hour match and they went bill to bell and beyond that you had a guy, a veteran Terry Funk, I wasn't carrying but helping to make new stars in Saboo and Shane Douglas. It got out of control in every way, and the fans love, they really loved it. They really loved it. You know. There was a like a settle around to the clause and the fans, and then you know, I was laying I catched my brother, I said, looking around, and Sherry Martell's the one actually learned me to the first year of Oh my god. I was lying here in shut stand. So I looked at her like I didn't know there was a fans jumping over the railing and what was going on. I looked up at her and said, I sat looking around, and that's when I realized the fans coming into ovation. Well, the match ended, I just stood up and gave a standing ovation and applayed it for five about five minutes. I was sitting right by the rail. As the wrestlers came by, I high fived them. And after the show, I would wait for my friend George, and I saw, you know, the wrestlers, you know, hanging around the building, and I went up to each one of them and said, wow, that was one of the greatest matches I ever saw in my life. You guys, that was awesome. That was the payoff. It certainly wasn't what Paully Hannah was at the game in the night. The payoff was the fans. The payoff was a group there, they're they're tightness. They they also evolved that night. They evolved into a wonderful, wonderful cold and following and we love them as much as they lit on their habit, Boss, they evolved into a wonderful cult. Right Terry Funk reflecting on the Three Light Bands, A man did history do that match a lot of favors. I'm not saying it was a bad match, but the way they're elevating, Oh my god, I know they're talking about like this it it went an hour? What an hour? Sure? Did you didn't notice? No, only the only Shane Douglas went the full hour because they had that stipulation, oh right, right right, right, right, right right, and they did a freeway sleeper hold once you got in there, and that was it. Right. Yeah, I mean they're making it seem like it was fuck, it's not. They're just you know, to me, there weren't enough people in the building to take away from that night that it's all changed now. I highly doubt if I watch the next two, three, four, five, six, seven ECW shows after that, that I would feel any differently than I would have felt about that show and the one right before it. But there's a difference in wrestling, and I think ECW really puts a fine point on this. There's a difference in wrestling between the story the boys think that they tell themselves based on what the experience, not so much when the cameras were rolling, but before, during, and after yeap, like they know in their gut when they felt differently about coming to work every day, when a match or an angle transformed their sense of where this thing could be going. And I'm not going to begrudge them that. I'm not going to doubt that they hold those notions true, even if it wasn't apparent to the naked eye just watching the show on tape, you know, but to be in that building, I mean, apparently there are fans who will swear that that reached a higher level than what they were used to experiencing watching an ECW wrestling card. And we do have to remember that that sixty minute draw mentality that Terry funk, you know, drank from the cup of through the seventies and in his dad's time, and his brother certainly did. That was an extinct species. For all intents and purposes, in pro wrestling in the nineties, you weren't getting sixty minute title matches. It wasn't something that people even thought of as something the world champion should be capable of in order to be deserving of the title World champion. That was. That was an old notion that Rick Flair kept alive for a little while through the eighties, but for the most part was shit. For the most part was dead. You know, a couple of champs after Terry lost it. When Yeah, Barnett kind of started booking the champion, it started to be a title that was mostly controlled by Georgia or or Charlotte and really wasn't an international touring thing first and foremost anymore. And the champions that they thought of suddenly Dusty, Tommy Rich others became Kerry von Erik, These temporary champions who got the strap for the sake of a one night business pop or or you know, to get a territory going, or to give a territory a boost. That was never a reason to put the NWA title on somebody until right after Terry's era. Really in the the Harley era, Harley was the one losing the championship to a Dusty and losing the championship to a Tommy Rich and you know sort of he he, So in a lot of ways, it died with Terry Funk. This idea of the world champion is somebody that you know, had had world class in ring skills. Yeah, could make anybody look like they were the best pro wrestler in the world in any given territory they touched down. And the only person in the business that would be traveling state to state to state and flight hopping the entire country and indeed the world. And you know a big part of that sixty minutes. And so to bring that to ECW in nineteen ninety four when nobody saw it coming on that night, I can see why it would resonate. I can see why it would feel memorable by the time it was over. I remember that it a sixty minute men with a Sena and John Shawn Michaels and John Cena on Monday Night Raw in like ten thousand two seven. It was after it was funny because it was after WrestleMania when they had already had their their match, and the one on Raw was like ten times better than the one they had. It was ten times better. Yeah, one of the best matches in Raw history. And it was again something you didn't see coming, and that was so key. You know, it's not an iron man match. It's not a match that you said at the front end is going to be sixteen minutes either way, and that's you know, that's great too. But when we talk about when we talk about this dynamic that the three Way Dance spoke to, and the dynamic that a Terry and a Dory and a Jack Brisco stood for, it's not the same thing Shawn Michaels was Spreadhart WRESTLME twelve. It's not even in the category of things we're talking about. Rock for Striple H's judgment Day two thousand is not in this category. It's not what we're talking about. We're talking about. The sixty minute match that unfolds is a drama that that goes sixty minutes because neither man can pin the other once, right, and that's what that was. So by the time two thousand and five, rolls around and the ECW nostalgia is in full tilt. That's the way the Terry Funk Shane Douglas Sabou nineteen ninety four to three Way Dance that the night the line was crossed was being remembered and talked about. And then to close the documentary, it's it's a memorable scene. The Funker brought along to the shoot a copy a WWE contract that was offered to him to work the ww one night Stand show. Now, these shows were a week apart, and there were wrestlers, many of them, who worked both shows. There was not like this edict that if you work one, you can't work hours and vice versa. But if you're Terry Funk, you really can't because you know that if you go out there at your age in two thousand and five, I mean, think of how old he just looked in that nineteen ninety seven run that we ranged. How about two thousand and five, Okay, he debuted in wrestling. His premiere in wrestling was in nineteen sixty five. R Funk was born in nineteen forty four. That would make him how old in two thousand and five he was? He'd be sixty one, thank you. He's not turning around putting in an effort that he's proud of in Philly and the next week going on a ww pay per view, it's not happening. He had to pick one over the other just due to the nature of where he was at physically, and further, he kind of liked that one last middle finger to WWE when they came knocking on his door because they found a chance to make money off something that he basically built on his own back without their help, in defiance of them. In fact, that the motivating factor for building the whole thing was that it wasn't something that they could benefit from. It wasn't something that they could afford to replicate, though they went ahead and did it for sure. Funk would even spend a version of things where he said, you know, we killed Vince's opposition ECW did. ECW killed WSW because we gave WWF to playbook to come back when they were on the ropes due to the nWo angle, the elements that DCW put in the wrestling ring, from the hyperviolence to the swearing, to the nudity, to the table crashes to all the stuff to the great promos and in the wild crazy, you don't know what's going to happen next. Angles that's what put WCW down. That's how Terry Funk looked at it. And so he's sitting for these documentary cameras and he has a copy of the contract that WWWW had furnished him to work there one night stand in two thousand and five, and he delivers a speech about why he made the decision he did. I had an opportunity to go into the WWE at this time, and they sent me a contract, and sent me a very good contract. And this is a contract here, and it's not that it's anything special or anything, but that's for quite a sum of money. And it certainly isn't for what Hull Cogan, Triple h or Ric Flair or the Undertaker makes, but it was for quite a bit more money than for this group that I'm going to perform for. And I had a choice, And I had to make a choice between the two companies because I know at my age and my time again is that I can't perform two shows that close together. So did I want to go for the man that possibly not possibly that did a lot to destroy the company? Did I want to go for the fellow that made millions of dollars with the rise and follow VCW that had nothing to do with it. Do I want to go for the man that is going to have an ECWS show that could give a damn about ECW. Did I want to go to a show that he's going to have fans that are simulating ECW fans. No, I wanted to go to an e W show. I wanted to go to a show where it's an extension of the guy's personalities and not a convincement man's group or whatever it is. So I chose to go back and enter into the ring, into the three way dance, and that took a lot of thought on my part. I talked to it about my wife with my wife, and she says, Honey, at your age sixty years old, you ought to be looking at the box and you better be up there at the Vince McMahon showing. I said, honey, I said I. I said, Honey, I can't do it. I want to go back to the guys that I love and the guys that I uh, the guys that I have been down the road with the UH and that's why I'm not a millionaire because I've done the things that I have wanted to do instead of the things that I probably should have done. Disc thirty seven Bus Disc thirty seven It's time for the Three Way Dance. June tenth, two thousand and five, ECW Arena, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Terry Funk makes his choice and steps in against Shane Douglas in SABO one more time. It's at the very top of the video. So when you're ready, I'm ready. I'm ready three to two one play well during that short break, folks, the the commissioner, the commissioner himself of the Pennsylvania State after Joey Styles on the call for this one, I guess he thought that it was fakere gimmick. I forgot they brought Joey after coming. It's the real deal. And yet it's going to the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission, the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission. Francine with the franchise. Uh, he definitely looks like he's been eating it a franchise. Yeah, I give you a couple of guesses. Definitely stopped at wah wah on the way and I'll tell you and Joey Styles making reference to it. There was a big uh fallout between Francine and Hane Douglas and didn't talk to each other for years after a c W folded and Artco Homecoming was really the thing that brought them back together and saw them reconcile. There's the barbed wire, there's the old arena. Shane Douglas in a yellow T shirt, YEP and a broken right wrist. It looks like it's casted, just like we're doing. What's that just like we're doing. That's exactly right. It's exactly right. And no, unlike the Barbier and the Terry Funk Sabou match from ninety seven, they don't have like barboiers strapped vertically and sideways like all over the place, just three strands of wire. The Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission had concerns about a Barbier match, at least they played that up. The Commission was always a big heel in ECW from really day one, even the Todd Gordon days. They would present the Commission to something looking to shut this down, which in some cases was actually a shoot. They basically made a Todd Gordon into like the face of the commission at a certain point something like that, Yeah, there's the signature entrance is Francine all across the ring. Franchise lays one on the franchise and it's so good to be the franchise. I right say so. Having to go to the the MIDI Files, the Serious World takeoff, Jane Douglas has the mic, it's time for some f bombs. Ah, thank you shamee. Tonight's artcom coming. What's the original brandchild? Who loved the franchise? Shane Douglas, He said, the family click, they moved back together. I said, a funk. You can't come this t you need really needs right, hold back an hold off. When he told me about it last year's were they saying, You're saying fuck Crick Flair and this fuck? I said to myself, Francis Meta herself, show your ts chancer back to wow. Oh Manns were always classy here and fill it out. That's right. But I was thinking of same thing, the same thing. What Terrence he said, Terrence? He said, Terrence. His name is not Terrence. No, my name's not Terrence, but my brother's name is darn right. Just keep it straight. God, damn man, I say you may go across list any sat retired turn her sabots of a saboo king and king king king King, got a king king in King King King King, Me me me me me alphants, get this man a flying carpet as he comes out with his headdress on. Ho hey ho hey hey, it looks like Shawn Michael's like now producing an x T in a in like a cameo. Yeah right, look at like Sean at that fucking uh Saudi show collecting cash. I wadn't I want ahead and collected cash for that ass Tammy Sich. What a sad case. Another casualty of extreme Oh yeah, oh my god, just a just a casualty to the ring. Oh my god. This two thousand and five is that? Yeah? I guess she'd done those videos with Missy at that point. Huh, yep, she'd done those, but on the one where she gets you know, she gets sucking pummeled, raspy voice, it had I got that. I remember I had that dvd, miss One. Yeah, oh yeah, I'm sure you did whatever wrestling vixens exactly. It had. It was like Missy Hyatt and Sonny and then a bunch of like I had no idea the fun they were Japanese other women, very appreciate and respectful fans here in Philadelphia. See what you will about that. They are a little blood Thursday. They are a little rude, hey do you like to see their boobies? But they're also very respectful when they see legends. Truth. I mean, hadn't Haden Saboo and Terry Funk learned their lesson with barbed wire that what? In fact, they probably thought that that was one of the most they were right and impactful things they ever did in E c W. So let's try to recall that dynamic just a bit with the barboire. Plus, it's a crutch because they're so old. Saboo still looks I mean he's flabbier but still fleet of foot. But the Funker, I mean he's do anything original. So and Douglas too, is it? Yeah? A fat and his jeans. H it's tough that you throw streamers in the ring the barb wires strung, I know, right, it's for shade Douga and his black jeans. Such a fucking he's so it's like he looks like his own mug shot, right, and exactly he does. He's turned out. They're happy to see him. Let's listen in this is not a triple threat match. This is a three way dance. It is an elimination match up. Yeah, I'm like the first time they actually have to clarify the difference by go five between triple threat and dance. Two men, great men must be eliminated in this format. Let's see what they can do. Tabo diving on the legs of a franchise who backs up and shoots him a bird funk with a baggy ass t shirt on ahead and I went ahead and got baggy. Those wrists are taped and those hands are jumped on them. I'll learn a barbed wire threat. Jesus lay collar and elbow. Oh my god, fucking kill me. Now, what a lame, stupid three way headlocks? Fine, yes, but the it's it. The guy a prayer in a prayer circle before lights football, which in some ways I mean standing switching out. It's a triple waistlock. I guess are they giving a terry funk the London Bridge right now? Ah, franchise touches the wire. Think it's fat under the wire. No, it's so bad ah, that Funk just suddenly stumbles in the into it. Yeah, he just threw himself in. What the feel like? Referee Bill Kirkinbauer, star of the TV show Just the Ten of Us ship. What's his name, Bill Kirkinbauer. Oh, that was John Finnegan with Let's see k I R C H E N B A U E R. I'm having trouble here. The Funk are covered by Sabou off the wire for two. Let's he from Just the Ten of Us was the show so good? Double whip on the franchise, and he baseball slides under the wire, saves his ass and says something like, fuck you. I'm sure the stray half guys there, the Howard Stern guy's there, all of them. They're all they're all there. Why do they call him Howard Stern guy? It looks more like Rob Zombie. Yeah, sure, yep. You got Mike Johnson from p W Insider there as well. Chair set up. Funk's gonna fly, Both guys on the outside off the chair seats gonna fly. Funk's just gonna sit there and take it. It's correct. They come alive in the arena. God, Funk try to stand up while I can't. I went ahead and tried, Vicky, I couldn't stand up. He's calling her from the cell phone on his back, Vicky, can you fly out? I can't get up. That means you to help me up. I gotta stay here until until you help me out. There's that spot again with funking Saboo where he leans the table on its side and runs him into it. Yeah, but to see that one still good? Are you shine, Terry Funk? See? The thing is Terry Funk's facial expressions make you realize that it's might be a little bit more real to him at this point. Oh yeah, he's feeling actual pain with every step he takes. They got Funk's head on the bottom strand of wire raking it, and then Douglas grabs Saboo and does much the same. They got a multi camera shoot here, and they keep they keep cutting to like a dual view. Whatever do they call that? Split screen? Yeah, some kind of split screen look. Certainly not a production element they had at their disposal when they first did this in nineteen ninety four. A single camera shoot for the first three day dance was a challenge. Indeed, I cannot imagine what it's like to have your face back in now. Oh dude doing what it takes, takes the wire on his bare mask. Didn't you learn, dude, like when your bicep was ripped apart? He learned is that unless you do something that dangerous again, people are gonna feel let down. That's what wrestling teaches you is when you mess up and get really hurt, you raise the steaks. Ironically, Funker just stumbling around throwing the left. Even at that age, I want to head. I want to head when I when ahead, when I had foot, Oh fuck ends up entangled. Oh that t shirt ripping off the Funkers, Oh Jesus Christ, still going for it. And finally the franchise taste Sabo, I'm gonna do a moon salt onto the barbed wire. He brings out like like one of those buckets they used to fix traffic lights. And then I'll tell you what. I'm gonna take a knife and stab myself on the shoulder. Yeah, that's the thing. He climbs up out of the bucket truck and oh Jesus, Sabo was gonna spring off the chair for air. Sabo, the chair God Saboo just stumbled chest first into the wire, and that one looked like it's sunk deep. They've returned to the arena to leave flesh on the floor of the new Elajambra. So he brings the bucket truck and instead of using it to jump off of for a spectacular height, he just goes up to the top of it and starts stabbing himself. Ah on ahead and stab myself. Yeah, Larry, but what do you have to do at the top of the bucket truck. He's a better man than I. I would not be making that noise if I was stabbing myself with people Like look at this, he's he's combing Terry Funk's hand with the wranchio. Come this fucking this is not a good thing. I don't need this fucking multi cam shit, Like, yeah, that was a bad idea. Just fucking well, they're not even doing Like one guy's on the floor and we have to keep tracking. We call spot there from Sabu as he starts frantically taping his his leg like he taped his arm in ninety seven, all three men run the razor and a bid to matter. In two thousand, I don't think they've run any razors. I think they just got their faces fucking caught on barbed wire. I could very well be true. Yeah, that could be a sleeper hold by Douglas on sab You know what this means, Terry, Terry, what's time for the spot? Let's do the spot here, I'm gonna come behind. I went ahead and went behind, having a double sleeper spot. Yeah, I got the fans riled up. Nice polite response to that. Yeah, polite is generous in this building. Yeah. Ac Stills and Douglass wearing two at a near Fox and Shane. Douglas is wearing multiple shirts and jeans for sake. He's dressed like just like he's gonna go fucking skiing in New Jersey. He's dressed. He's dressed like he's dressed like he's gonna put the Christmas lights up After thanks, Jimmy covered by Douglas. A kickout and douglas Land's stomach first across the center barbed wire strand hits the floor, ailing a holy ship chant from the u c W faithful. Has Hogan done ever done a barbed wire match? To my knowledge, really, Dusty and Tully Blanch did, and the Crocket screaming, and it's the first time I ever saw the hint of it. Funck did his stunner. Such a Donna do a stunner. It's a point in Terry's career. He just looks like it fell out of bed like fraw. He moves around like I mean, he's making He's making Doran's look fucking mobile. At this point I went ahead and dropped him on his head. Come on, Shane, Come on, Shane, she's so get in there. You're kidding me. Oh, Sabo dumped out of the front row is actually a packed house, so it's not easy to find space. I think that's the whole Cogan imitator right there behind Sabo. Oh where Oh he's always go to w W Sevy shows, just Hogan Tony. He was, oh, yeah, I know what you're talking about, brother, some guy going fuck yeah, yeah. Saboo just threw a commeminative chair and chained up his face. That's one thing they didn't worry about in the old ECW was commemorative chair. Yeah right, that was That wasn't a thing for them. Come across many of those raining chair from the lawsuits from the evidence room franchise drops Sabo's stomach first with a gourdbuster. That's a call back to the ninety seven match. That's the moment Sabo started taping his arm frantically while hanging upside down. Holy ship, chance is it's the holy Ship moment? Okay, Alfonso was trying to up and here we go more t Look at that, like we've seen this before. Yep, pants get fucking rip, pants getting torn and ripped, and it's like it makes you think to yourself, maybe it's not a good idea to fucking do a barbed wire match. I see chairs flying out of the ring. I'm wondering, gosh, who could that be? Yeah, I when I hadn't tossed some chairs into make things a little more interesting the match, I thought the match was kind of slowing down some. So I said, you know what, let's throw some chairs and and see what happens. And also, barely, let's get the ringing, punching dolls on the nuts. And I went ahead and tossed a chair about as lightly as I possibly could, like throwing one of those one of my daughter's goddamn stuffed animals. Okay, Fuku, look at the man, What do you see? I see just a just a man who's been destroyed by playing life, by his like, by his choices. It's that laps. Fuck you knew we'd get here. Yeah, he's just, yeah, just walking around in hope of like some Eureka moment, you know, where all makes sense, keeps taking and as much barbed wire on bare flesh as he can to keep this match rolling. He's probably hit the wire flesh first four times in this match than he did in the ninety seven one at this point. Yeah, I think so. The middle come on, we his arms, tary, son of a bitch, tut me out of here, Cut me out of here, you son of a bitch. Okay, all right, Alfonso, knock it off a panic dad, I'm trying to cut the wire. Yeah, but stop blowing the fucking whistle. After Jesus Christ, thank you please. That whistle is so fucking annoying and not like in a you know, good heat kind of way. It's like, oh, pussy, Yeah, all of a sudden, fans are shoved friend sing down on the floor and you get your throng. Yeah. Yeah, they're repeating the spots that were kind of like messed up and led to injury and those are the legendary spots. Oh no, being hung by his neck on Saboo. You should go ahead and get turned upside down into the damn ropes, into the damn barbed wire and get tangled up and have your necks exposed to to to barb the first time. So I was shaving in the ring cleared house with a chair while personnel suit to free Saboo. You know that. Listen to Funk, piece of shit. He is a bloody mess, barely moving, moving at molasses pace on the canvas with Shane Douglas standing over him, and the Funker is just like you, piece of shit. You know he's as he's about as pissed as he was at Foley that fucking yelling at him. Oh, sab got the barbed wired of his hair, so that's good. Its yeah. One among the people Shane Douglas hit with a chair was the referee new ref in the ring. Cover on Funk by Douglas two not enough and a cover on Saboo. But went ahead. Oh he did he come to jabs funks going to the boxing no matter how many years and decades past. Man when he says that left left hook down the pipe. It's going down. Yep. It looks like an old man would throw a punch, but that doesn't mean it would hurt. Oh fuck the chair shot across the back of a prone franchise Terry Funk, his white shirt completely stained pink crimson. If you wheel scene with words of encouragement into the ear of Shane Douglas. Oh my god, I cannot stand his whistle. That whistle like it's it's not fun. It's not like like the kind of thing that you're you're like, oh yeah, like that like it's annoying. It's like just it's distracting and takes me out of this fucking garbage any I mean, franchise has a chain wrapptor on his fist and you just hit the referee with it. Another referees to do their job exactly. He does not want to win this match, drops Funk with another chain shot. Overall, boss, we're here at this juncture of the contest. Is this a worthy successor to the original? Classic? Uh? Did I think the original was a classic? I don't remember it's number one, but number two? No, this is not like again, I mean I get it, I mean I get it. You get to gotta get a payday. But man, this is bad stuff as the promoter, as the promoter, hard prow homecoming all along. Douglas now lording over a Funk with a steel chair, but non Saboo went across the back for the funker. Yeah, minutes minutes before this match. Jup, he gonna he's gonna do the credit headed next snap is he Terry Stamps. I'd be wild if you did that up conspired he did it. Funk is convulsive. Crowd just kind of lethargic. They're like they want to be excited, but they're kind of like, uh, was that it? It's kind of lame. The biggest whitest stage possible here at hardcorel Bunk now covered by Saboo. No ref to win this match. Job came here, took the joy's Doows explained, sh in fact did not come here to win the match. He came here to cripple. That kind of defeats the purpose and it drop Sabo in the wire chest first again and now Shade Douglas with a ladder set up in the ring. Now there's a ladder in the ring. Well, that was one thing that was missing from the ninety seven match. Yeah, you need a ladder, but Shane Douglas is now climbing. Hey, Douglas was gonna finish. Terry has rolled over to a chair and now banging his head against it. You see that he's laying on a chair like a pillow and he gets banging the side. He's pumping the canvas. Lights go out, Oh ship, let's turn up the volume for this. What has happened? Finally he did, oh, oh wow, is here in a Recerree shirt? And he did not ask Vince McMahon permission. He was on a contract. He said, I'm going, wow, you want to be here for you see Dobb and the Funkers and they're on their feet in the arena. That's an E. C. W Worthy surprise Douglas and he sides with Douglas. Oh no, he doesn't only yanks Douglas off the ladder. He's got the w W stripe referee shirt, he's got Socco. He's going there booing. But if you don't think Mick Foley knew that was coming, then you don't know the depth of the hard poor genius. He said, he's got boo the Soco as he locks it on Douglas. Douglas that sock, he said, it's just a sweat sog. Fuck the sock they chant it was Funk lazy in the shots on Douglas double arm too on Shane Douglas h Cactus and now he realizes, Ladder, what does he have to do for Socco to be worthy in the arena. He's got our have Soco as much barbed wire as he can get his hands on. Man. He puts the barb wire Soco claw in Shane Douglas's mouth. Lord, and what the fuck they're looking for the abdominal stretch pain. Of course, that's when you go. You gotta see his folks ll Shane throws a chaered Douglas's head. He falls back into the cover of Funk and it's over. One, two, three, Shane Douglas has been eliminated. It's not over but right, well, I agree with that, but see Doug. Chance for the return of Nick Foley. Oh god, he went in so many ways on the mic, found himself in E c W staring across the ring with Terry Funk. Funk is now putting the spinning to hold on Douglas. Afterwards, whilst Saboo positions. The chair leaps off it in the sunset, Flip pulls down the Funker. Funker rolls all the way through, stacks up Saboo fully down to count one two. Oh wait a minute, Saboo's got Barbara tied up in his pants. I don't even think. Oh my god, yeah that was from mc pholey's hand. Now Terry Funk's lining up a catapult on Saboo into what all the way to the christ shot through all the way to the top three floor. Now they know which of the three faces of fully they prefer. In the ECW arena, you are watching hardcore home Coming from the one and only arena in South Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Is Terry Funk going ahead and folding on a table? I believe he is going ahead this three? If only he could get ahead, it's all, It's all he wants from from VICKI to get ahead. Right was eliminated, leaving only Sabo's back on the attack, But Funker cuts him off, splays him across the table, and goes for the ladder. Is it ever enough, Terry? He always goes for the ladder, He never goes to the former. Yeah, yeah, if only he would go for the former ones, Terry, it's two thousand and five. Do you really need to be climbing this ladder? Oh? No, a complete disaster. God, I should just hope that's not some kind of metaphor. A ladder the Funker was climbing on with Sabo and a table behind him completely collapses, and Funk still managed to land on the table and break that ladder. So now Sabo is gonna improvise. He's probably gonna start shooting himself in the head at this point. Ah, facebuster with the chill on Funk's face. That could do it cover fully someone Two three, Sabo wins, Bumper does the honors. That's like him being pissed. You fucked up the spot, Funk. It was, But I'll you know what, I'll be damned if that wouldn't have been a great idea for a finish. Yeah, Terry Funk takes one risk too many. Yeah, the apparatus collapses. Anti can can rebound this time from this? Had one back King, King, King the Boss. Fun. It's the last fun if you're ever gonna do it all? Phenomenal? Can I tell you phenomenal? I hear Terry Chance heard that's Terry Fun somehow makes his way back to his feet. I'm not able to stand though it fully checking on his mentor clutching the bad knees in the ankle. Saboo comes over to Terry Funk and offers his hand. That's a full circle moment. YEP. So many ways Terry Funk helped usher Saboo onto the national stage. Sabo doesn't have that remarkable nineteen ninety four without Terry Funk and his cachet being willing to share the square circle and, as Saboo explained, willing to take the moves that Saba was bringing to American wrestling rings. They're here Hardcare Home Coming two thousand and five. Every prize they chant Terry as he embraces Sabo in the middle of the ring. It Foley as well. There's something there in that building. Yeah. Yeah. They're going around the horn chanting everybody's name. Yes, Ian Rotten, who was on the card, Tracy Smothers two Cold Scorpio, It's Todd Gordon, so much other e Stevy personnel, And to thank you Shane for putting the card together. Tammy sich A against J. T. Smith, got kid Cash Simon diamond and the Funker. Yeah, being helped out, bloodstained T shirt, bloody forehead, limping the knees is nick fully described in his book. They look like they were drawn on. Terry Funny. Yeah, what a mess, Please come back. Oh he will not worry Terry Funk. Terry, look at that Todd Gordon all these years later raising the hand of the Funker. Wow in the isleway of the arena and hardcore Homecoming is in the books and so right, Terry Funk stands on business. He stands on principal. Fuck Vince McMahon show. Fuck Vince McMahon's ec dub. Fuck that contract that he sent me? Right boss? Right? Sure? Or does one push come to shove? Part of the genius of Terry Funk is part of the genius of Terry Funk that he finds a way to get paid by the corporate superstructure that he spent his career trying to rail against in small but opportune ways along the way. And indeed, the next year, Terry Funk went ahead and participated in what you could say was the ECW ring for the last time at the WWE's version of ECW One Night Stand in two thousand and six, once again to the Hammerstein Ballroom. We turned to mc foley's book now to set the stage. So what you're going to convey here to the Solar System Boss is from his book Hardcore Diaries, which I think is third edition. This was him talking about, you know, the two thousands, the aughts period of his career and the storylines he pitched. And he gets really detailed on what it was like to bring the idea to w W brass to do McK foley, Terry Funk, Tommy Dreamer Edge tag team match. That is to say Tommy and Tommy and fully know what was it. It was Edge and Foley against Tommy and Terry, and how that was proposed to Vince McMahon and the WWE brain trust to take it away. I'm well into the wind up about to release the pitch number one. Quote number one. We need to firmly believe that Terry Funk can get over as a main event attraction in a very short time. I turned to Dusty, who knows Terry as well as anyone in the business. I think I think the Dream Dusty's nickname is American Dream. Can vouch for me when I say that even at age sixty, Terry does a real vincent job of making fans think he's out of his mind. That's because he is out of his mind, the dream says with a laugh, eliciting further laughs from around the table. Vince isn't laughing, but he is smiling, which is a good sign. His relationship with Terry has been in a contentious one over the years, heading back to nineteen ninety three, when Terry walked out in a major pay per view, leaving only a note that read, my horse is sick. I think she's gonna die. I think I better go. I went, you know, I gotta, I gotta go ahead and get out of here. My horse is sick. I think she's gonna die, And I think I need to eat a piece of pie. What do you think of that? Is in the airport, like bridgeport, eating pie, waiting for his plane, like not even like but it's like it's it's it's one of those uh uh you know those little box pies you get at the supermarket. What they call it? They can't think of that. The fucking table talk yep, yep, I mean number two. We need to firmly believe that edge and I can form one of the most unique short term tag teams in recent history. There's a general feeling that that item number two had distinct possibilities and number three. For this angle to work, Vince, you really need to get physically involved. Then onto the glorious ceremony, where after being regaled with live music and a Vegas production number I would attempt to plant that kiss, but would see my valiant what is what happened here? Do we skip something? Well? Kind of? So his idea. Mcfoley's idea was that Terry Funk would join I don't want to step on a pop here. I'm not sure what he's talking about. He knows that he wants to do something involving the Vince McMahon kiss my Ass club. I think he's gonna go. Mcfoley's gonna kis the acid seems like right? And then keep going and you'll see that there's more to them. But would see my valiant attempt interrupted by that no good Terry Funk, who would attempt to take me out of this fateful decision by appealing to my pride, my manhood, my legacy, whatever it might take to get my lips out of the general proximity of Vince's ass. Then justs as Terry is really reaching Meess is about to talk me out of this tasteless moment of oral anguish. Bam, there's Edge laying out the Funker, snapping me back into reality, making me realize the treacherous act that Funk was about to perpetuate. Then we'd lay the boots into Terry, much to Vince's delight. It's funny quote. Then Vince, you'd going on the mic, you say, damn it, someone's gonna gonna kiss my ass, and I'd get Funk over here, and Vince you get this huge smile of satisfaction on your face as human lips meet human ass, and you know, to get you know, a Terry Funk payday on an ECW pay per view in WWE, you have to somehow work in Vince getting his ass kiss absolutely fully at his fucking most genius. Yes. Then of Vince's look, Vince looks like he's in heaven. This is this is going to be better than I expected. But in a split second, that smile would turn into a look of abject horror as you realize that Terry Funk is tearing a chunk out of your ass. I could say that that's a famous story where he bet a guy in the astor in a bar fight. Oh my god, the table erupts. A couple of the writers nearly fall out of their chairs. My summation is just a formality. As everyone agrees that this idea is foolproof. Vince can come back madder than ever. He can take out his frustration on DX. He can join forces with Me and Edge and are attempted to derail the ECW pay per view. Sure it might hurt his pocketbook, but something is more valu something far more valuable, has already been hurt. His ass, his pride too, his his ass and his pride and his pride and his ass. Mister McMahon and his ass. Yes, McMahon ass, nan, I love that, McMahon ass. That's that's been hurt as well. From there, it's a short step to Funk and Tommy Dreamer facing Me and Edge at ECW's One night Stand. Brian Gowertz has one small concern quote, Las Vegas is the night of the DX is supposed to get to Vince can't have that. Well, my heart momentarily sinks, but thankfully Gowartz isn't done. I think if we move it up a week to the fifteenth, it would be even better. We're in Lubbock, Texas, right outside of Terry's hometown. A rush of enthusiasm goes around the table. I think everyone sees the potential of Terry Funk taking a bite out of Vince McMahon's ass in his West Texas stronghold, where the Funk name is almost synonymous with wrestling. I say goodbye to the creative team. Stephanie publicly thanks me for dressing up for the meeting, then asked me privately if her comment hurt my feelings. Of course not. My wardrobe or lack thereof is a personal choice I made a long time ago. It's more than fair game for innocent teasing. Vince wraps me up in a big hug. It seems that we've got ourselves a deal, a deal I can't wait to commence. He likes me, he really likes me, and the truth is I really like him again. But it hasn't always been that way. Only if a person on the creative team had their way, there would be no ass biting, no instantaneous star making, no reason to tune in next week, no reason to pay for the privilege of seeing an all time great like Terry Funk. Why they were worried? How well, look, if someone who isn't even on our roster is the downfall of the kiss my Ass club, Oh my god, that's got to be Michael Hay. You know, Vince, you've been probably is you know, as you've been building this up for for for a long time, you know, to kiss my ask to the point, now, do you really do you really want a guy who's not on roster, not on regular roster, but kind of like a guest come in and kind of tear that all that enough, This is somebody that you can't trust as far as you can throw them. How many more times does Terry have to leave you high and dry, Bill Goods before you get that's the thing. Terry does leave me right when I needed most. Brother, What what did you testify against me? Of my life? Now? I I well, I mean I was, I was, brother, I was the question I dude, I what I did? Brother? I saved your ass? I testify against you in the trial of of of of of your livelihood, brother, Terry. Brother. Yeah huh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know what. Ah, who's asked, am I kissing tonight? Hah? Ain't that the question Terry Funk always asks himself upon entering a building. So this is WWE, and when you have a great idea and everyone gets excited, that's only the beginning, because now you have to deal with the inevitable second guessing right, and people who don't like the people who will shine in the segment, finding reasons to find fault with the creative and plant seeds of doubt in Vince McMahon's mind. Vince McMahon, of all the things he loves, he loves nothing more than oh yes, he loves nothing more than to make a plan just to rip it up at the last minute because he's the boss, and the moment that it's envisioned here and so passionately sketched out by Mick Foley at the Tower never happens. Terry Funk never takes a chunk out of Vince McMahon's ass on WW television, but they still do keep the match intact for the two thousand and six SCW One Night Stand pay per view. This, of course, coming off Mick Foley and Edge having an insane match at WrestleMania with a flaming table, but they're able to kind of meander their way into them teaming together just that summer with Leda the Third Woman, and fully talks also in the book about how Vince was very insistent on including Bulah on the men's side, feeling like just two the men on men versus the you know, the two verse two wasn't gonna be enough of a dynamic to carry an entertaining match that they would need to have interactions between Lida and Bulah as well as part of the recipe. So whatever Folly makes the concessions he needs to to get the match in the ring, that's WW four. You you start with the perfect vision for what you want, get excited, think you have a full proof pitch, and address every single what about, and then you end up making six or seven compromises at the very end because you know what the fuck, at least we need to get something out of this, and that's their way of getting their way every time, and that's the system. Guys like Terry Funk raged against it. It's kind of funny because like, do you not think that the like what aren't you getting from this incredible thing like everything is, you're going to get more out of him. No one would forget the raw where Terry Funk bit Vince's ass. Now, it would be a legendary moment. It would be perfect for Terry to do that because he had the reputation of somebody that actually might do something like that, right, But it wasn't to be. But there was still a lot of hay to make because Mick Foley, as he always does when you put the live microphone in his hand, he's got a backstory that he's going to call upon to bring out passions to convince you that there's more than just a phony bloonney wrestling reason that he wants to step into the ring with this guy, including his beloved mentor Terry Funk, because he had been he had been nursing a pit a punchline. He had been nursing an attack line on Terry Funk that dated back to two thousand and three when the WWE did a hardcore salute to McK foley and Madison Square Garden where they brought out a lot of people from his past to lute him and kind of did it to mcfoley Knight and presented him with an honorary Hardcore Championship belt and all the rest, but conspicuous by his absence at the ceremony despite a request that he'd be there was Terry Funk mm and Foley apparently is to hear him tell it, didn't say a word about it until it was time to take the ring. In two thousand and six, on Monday Night, Raw to cut a promo that would convince you that you had to see him stand across the ring one more time from Terry Funk with an ECW banner hanging in the rafters. Not so fast, factors. I know the reason why you humiliated Tommy Dreamer. I know that reason you he humiliated him, And I want to know why, Nick, Why did you humiliate him? Tell me you don't want to know? Can you just say he knew why he's hum Yeah, I want to know. I want to know why you humiliated him? Why did you go that far with Tommy Dreamer? That's what I'm asking you. Well, I'm gonna tell you why, Terry. Because that wrestle media eds and I made history. We have the greatest hardcore mats the world had ever seen. But great of his story. So oh, it was brutal to hold. I know I'm better than listen to me, yes, because I will be damned of a few weeks after making history. I'm gonna stand by and let some second rate he CW scumbats come in to our house. I'll play in HOWI and portray themselves as of what hardcore is all about. It's not going to happen. So maybe it is. And I made a little pact to defend what it was that we created. Because Terry, I'm telling you this, there are three things in this life that I will defend with my life if necessary. The honor of my wife, the honor of my children, and the honor of my legacy as the hardcore wrestling professional legends. You don't get it, do you? Mat It just don't get it. You are e c W. E c W is family, and family is E c W. And I'm family. And I want to tell you something, Mint. I've been with you through the years, and I've fought you, and I've battled you, and I'll tell you what. You broke my nose, and I've broke your nose, and you beat the hell out of me, and I beat the hell out of you. And we've been in bar boyar and we've been in fires and everything else, but I always put my arm around you, said, Nick, damn it, you're a hell of a tough guy, and I want to go one step further. Nick, You're like a son to me. And that's why I'm standing with here, with you here and trying to talk to you tonight, like a son to me. Mick, You're a son to me. Mick. Am I a sun? You Sery, Yes, You're a sun to me. Am like a sun to here, like a sun. Mick. Well, let me tell you something bad. This is the first time you and I have stood together inside a WWE ring since nineteen ninety eight. It's a long time, isn't it. That's right? But it wasn't I supposed to be that way, was it? Remember two thousand and Great Jerry in Madison Square Garden in one of the greatest nights of my life. I was honored in a hardcore ceremony. Stone Colt Steve Auston had me the hardcore belt. I was surrounding that ring. Why men, I fought men. I respected hardcore lessends in their own right. Boy. I walked outside I had one question. I said, well, where was Where was Terry Funk? And you know where you were? You were out at the Double Cross ranch in Amarillo, Texas. Why that's right, that's right. I was in a Double Cross. I was at the Double Why because what I was told was We're sorry, Mick, Terry Funk wanted too much money to be there? Uh huh? How do you think that made me feel? It broke my heart, It broke you. You up the darm to stand here ye and say I'm like a son to you. Yes, you are like a So I'll tell you whats and a mean? No? You such a damn out. This is my w W Ray, He's a my w W fans. You see, one day I'm gonna get that phone ball. It's inevitable a year from now to maybe three or four telling me we're sorry, Nicky, the bunker's gone. Why to maybe come on out to Ammaro Wow, a few words in the service and I'll say why, I like to, but it's gonna cost you that awful lot of money. Bring me out to a dump like West Texas. No, No, no, no here, Holy he wats it right now? Pully? It won't cost the time. You know, why, Jerry, why I'll come to breathe. I'll bring you a big for fires if I have to, because I'm gonna show up at your funeral just to earn the rights to crawl over and stead on your grave, You greedy self possible son, best you got your nerve? Fully, I'm gonna john Wade You're ass. I'm gonna beat down out of you. Pully, Will you take your best shot? I'll take you take your best shine, take it. I said, take it, take it, Bully, hake it, Hagon, Hagon, take the best side and have the best you got. Come on, come on, Pully, make take it, take it. How could poly come out? Hey, Holly, if I had a headlight years, I'd have a circumcised Wow s an old ec w Lin brought back out what you say? I said, if I had a headline years, I'd have a circumcised bock is trying to get fully and flighty. Hey Holy, hey, Holy, your wife's a whore? Oh wow, maybe you have an air Hey Polly, Hey Holly, your kids are bastards. The just payo ck. Pully's faces pale. That's gotta do it. Come on, Paullen. Hey, hoy, hey fie, let's go suck so thrill some of the marks, all of them. That's some fun. That's great. So I don't remember that at all. We've covered two thousand and six One Night Stand in the archives as a as a Hopper request show. I'm not sure we spent as much time on the build up to this particular match as we did others like Johnsena losing the title to Rob van Dam in the main event, because otherwise, if Sina wins, we riot is one of the signs memorably said in the audience that night. But this was the run up. This is what they ended up with, A wonderful promo segment there in Lubbock between the two and h Yeah, that's that's all ECW coming back. That's the whole thing from the trial. Remember it shofs a homo And that's the one thing ye that ye just can't stand and now and that was of course uber heel kiss ass. I'm better than you. You hardcore fans are scum. W CW is the place of milk and honey mcfoley and now by not responding when Funk calls mcfoley's wife a whore by not responding when Funk calls his kids bastards, but responding when he calls w when he's his WW sucks. It's again that smarmy piece of shit mcfoley that it's supposed to evoke as he attacks, But there's no there's no cross examination in a civil trial where Mick admits that the the WW line was never uttered because that there it was said, and there the brawl commenced. So during the course of some of the physicality that they booked on WW television to build up to the pay per view, there's a moment where Terry has a little bit of trouble keeping his footing and kind of like falls over h and it apparently, according to mcfoley, second thoughts in the minds of some of the people pushing for this match across the finish line. And here's just one more excerpt from his book, Hardcore Diaries of what it was like despite a wonderful promo segment like that, trying to keep this match on the reels with the Funker as the concern start to set in about his physical abilities. Brian, at this point, the angle doesn't even resemble what I suggested, tell Vince his idea sucks. It's just that it's just what. Well, Vince is concerned that Terry, that Terry What won't be able to work a good match because he nearly tripped. Well, kind of, it was time for me to go into full Funker defense mode. It wasn't even it wasn't enough that we'd prove the naysayers wrong in Lubbock with one of the most compelling promos of the year. Now, I was going to have to make a case for the greatest wrestler I'd ever seen. Sure, he's sixteen broken down, so is Vince sick man. But I didn't stop Vince from putting on a hell of a show and one of this past many his main events. He did it by playing to his strength and avoiding his weaknesses, just like Terry will, just like I will, just like Dreamer will. Fortunately, one guy in our match, Edge doesn't have any weaknesses. Look, I know Terry's knees are bad. You know, they've been bad for twenty years. They were bad when we used to tear down the house in Japan eleven years ago. His back is bad too, It was bad in eighty nine when he was working with Flair, and he and had a cracked sacrum. He'd have to get out of his seat and after takeoff and get on his knees, leaning over his seat for the entire flight, and then he'd go out and tear down the house every night. This is good. I can take this to Vince, said Brian. Hell, take this to Vince, I said, tell him, I saw Terry Russell less than a year ago at Hardcore Homecoming and he tore the house down there too. There's going to be a hell of a lot more, a lot of emotion in that building on June. On June eleventh, we'll all fee off it. We'll put together a hell of a match. On second thought, Vince, don't watch that Hardcore Homecoming match. Yeah, don't just take my word for it that he tore me. Yeah, right, yeah, because if Vince saw the ladder collapse under that guy, that would be the last fucking straw. Yep. But I oh, for sure, I suppose he didn't. I heard there was some when they were playing that promo from rad that you were trying to say some things. I was having trouble hearing you. Yeah, any remarks you want to make about that promo or any No, No, it's just it's just wild that I don't I don't remember it, that's all. And I was watching pretty regularly at that time. There's a lot of good stuff in five oh six. There was a lot of compelling promos and a lot of hot stories. It wasn't it wasn't a time where like they only did two things a year that actually struck a chord, like in the Cmpunk days. So nothing really stands out so as much as you would expect. But that's the groundwork, and they managed to keep the match on the rails and overcome Vince's concerns about terry physical well being. And it's one more time in the WW ring for the Funker as it's the two thousand and sixties W one night stand pay per view, and they did a WW versus ECW like special on like an off time I think it was on USA Network to lead into the show. They had like a special time slot availability, and on that show, Mick Foley, standing alone in the center of the ring with a spotlight only illuminating the top of his head, brings us home with the following message for this one last battle with the Funker. On the big stage. Terry Bunk the greatest wrestler I ever saw. You look at Terry Punk and you see old man. You're not seeing the real Terry Bunk. His slaps hurt worse than most men's punches. His punches dole out concussions, and when he picks up a weapon, he can use it like no man ever has. He is n cruciating pain, waking up every single day looking for one more chance to have one great last match. I blew the son of a bitch up in Japan, and he came back and hugged me. I set him on fire in Philadelphia, and he put his arm around me. He doesn't put his arm around me anymore. I don't want your arm around me. Terry Punk, among many things fully said in that promo. They're paying audience to the idea that, you know, people might not see Terry Funk as a physical threat at his age, but you know, assuring the fans that the punch is hurt worse than you can imagine and the slaps can knock you out. Very smart and effective. Honing in there from McK foley on any drawbacks. People not used to seeing Terry Funk perform in recent years may have had, including Vince mcmann's own reservations. Foley was probably is seeking to stamp those out with that promo as much as any reservations the fans would have. They seem more than ready to see the Funk back in there. Still got this thirty seven open Boss, because you need to get to thirty five fifty seven long thirty five fifty seven again. The show available on the Archives in the traditional deep dive format with notes, but we're going to watch it along for the first time here together as part of the Lapsed Funk. One more ECW match for the Funker. Here we go. Oh oh okay three two one play Ing Ing Kang Kan Kan Kane Kano Ko Styles on the call, just a year after doing Hardcore Homecoming. This was when he was on regular, right, wouldn't what's that? He was already hired regular? Yes, full time raw I think yeah. I loved him on ROD. I thought it was great when they were doing everything they could to fucking replace j R. Stephen Dangelis on being announcing instead of Bob Bartes. Interestingly, now, Bob Artes was a Philly crony of Todd Gordon Paul Hayman was no fan of reing announcer Bob Artes, but he preceded Hayman and by a couple of days being involved with ECW, so he got to stick around only with the microphone here. He sold out, all right, alright, I I did sell out. I sold out Madison Square Garden, all right. I know I said a lot of bad stuff about e c W and talk on and I'm sorry because there was a time when I loved e c W, when I respected ECW, back in the days when it was run by a visionary, back in the days when it was owned by a true creative genius. Let's hear it for Stephanie McMahon did the alliance Oh god, oh my god, even so fucking awesome. Put it up about me. I know you guys paid the same. He is the co holder of the hardcore title. Escorted to the ring by Lada. Say hello to Heang Yang Nangan on this day he sees foggy. You know, I have to say this is like first chance I've had to say say this. I think it was a big mistake for him. He used this song in a w Have you seen him come out to this yet? Yes, just smacks of like we're content to imitate w w W. And I feel that way when Punk came out to cult the personality for some reason. I mean, I mean it might also be the difference though, is that didn't didn't didn't Punk come out to cult the personality like any any so, no, I thought I thought this was what he did, didn't when he was in by a five before that can run? Well, I don't know then, but I think it is is they copy all of the same camera angles and shots when he comes out and he stands in the same place in the aisle, they triger implicate that pyro that shoots the sky when he puts his fingers up. I mean, that's the thing I would say, it's go, let's do with the music. That's going to do with the fact that they're trying to copy the the whole presentation, the whole presentation Jewish as if as if a con haymen, as if we're like supposed to think that he's edge and not a Copeland like he should be shedding that skin, right, he can use the same music. I mean, I think it's great when you can when when you can use the same music and other promotions. I think that's fantastic, but you know, I just with him. I don't think they should have done it. I think it took away from him actual and continues to take away from his I wonder how it would work though. I wonder how you would feel if he didn't do the same entrance altogether. I do. I do want if it was just the music, because I don't mind it when the Hardy's come out to their w w F music and a w I think it's got more to do with his is full on thing. Yeah, I think it's it's that they try to replicate the Pyro. That's kind of It's like, I can come in, guys, but you know, we got a key. I've worked really hard on this entrance over the years, and I really, you know, I really, I really, I really depict face too. Yeah, I mean I've worked, you know, for years doing this entrance. Guys, her and her own right and E C. W Original Oh really actually worked there as a valet by the name of Miss Congeniality, the valet of a Danny Dorgan road Kill. Then got hired to be Leada s a Rios's manager. You know, I can guarantee you. That was more ob one night all of you had. I was just making references to the humiliations that Tommy Dreamer suffered in the one television of the week's leaning up to the show around O that way, he said, that's skank. You hang around a skink. No, No, I believe it's hanging around with that's skank you hang around with. No, that one's fineank you hang around It makes no sense hang around somebody around them, Yeah, but it comes Funk. He doesn't get his own entrance. I guess that's skank. You hang around. I don't know. It's like you're around them, but not necessarily with them, you know, but you're you're in the scene. It doesn't work for me. Those kids you Yeah, here's the Funker, towel in hand, Beulah, fully clothed, not looking looking like a mom. Yeah. Man, we've all grown up, haven't we. Bueler Terry Funk is now great grandfather right Well, I don't know if he's great at anything but family wise. But I don't know if he's a great grandfather or a bad grandfather. Dr Drilly fucking That was one of these simulated ec W fans that Terry was, so I believe these are simulated fans. Is that Lad? There's Lad yet? Glad Buddy Charlie whatever his name is, was always at the East w Arena, but I never saw Lad there. But he's here. He come on, come on flatting going to Philly for fucking for ship matches. Come on home. I mean he'll fly to Chicago for things, but he's not going to go to fucking Philly for E c W bullshit. He was at the h the A W Paper View on December thirtieth, and now on Long Island. Ye Bula getting some mic time. Wow clap back at Leda. I never thought today that flash that comes out of her mouth. It's more disgusting what you you we put in it. That is to say, she sucks dick. That's right, trashy dick. It's exactly correct. She's like, I don't suck trashy dick. I only sucked nice dick. Ah, how much you like three sucks? So we make it a let's make it three one two. That's a different way again. It neither put up or shut. Should have Stephanie come out and just declare let the bodies hit the floor before I like that line from a from Nick about c W. Stephanie, Yes, that was really funny to Lena. Cat fight spot between Beula and Lida and they're pulled apart the crotch. It means to be seen, not actually a wrestler, but what you say. So it was so much bigger than the arena. Yeah, very numorable TV tampings in this building, including there when they first came back to TNN and Raven came back and wow, the one fucking insane d d T did and won the tag titles in seconds with Dreamer, and they were going to reinvigorate the dream. The Dreamer Raven program starts off with Tommy Dreamer and Edge here at One Night Stand O six. Tommy Dreamer, how did you feel about the ec W matches and w W the whole the shows? I had a lot of hope. You know. It's funny as you were talking about this, and I really was. I was thinking about those days and I wanted I wanted e c W. You know, this is such the curse of the wrestling fan, is that all you want is to feel like you did. I mean, that's that's like addiction, you know, that's why you keep fucking shooting up. That's why you keep doing all that ship all over again because you want, Oh, let me interrupt, you tell you what's the tag? I want to hadn't had Terry and he steps in with w W con mix it up? The funker I want. I hadn't tagged Tommy Dramer and a paintbrush Mick Foley, and I said, you know what, let's get this ship on the road. Left and right. Slaps by the funker, those same slaps that fully sought to put over in that promo snippet we played that Foley goes to edge just wasn't a good idea. Trying a little. The funder of the ring, he stands in the middle, comes in and if it's a pure of sex. So you're saying about addictions, well, yeah, you know, because you just you always wanted to be like what it was and resemble that first time and and that magic of before, and so I was really hoping that this would be that that E C W would be that that missing you know, that that kind of missing thing that I was feeling that I was way uh hungering for back then, and I wanted it to feel like you did when I loved when I when I couldn't get enough of it in during the Attitude era, you know, and it just didn't you know, it didn't come close. It was such a homogenized product, especially when they went to sci fi and did a weekly television show. God, yeah, exactly, So I think people forget about EACW. Yeah, they had a weekly TV show, but they really only hit the arena once a month with cameras, so they had a month between big shows, right to think about angles and to think about things. They weren't a weekly live television show. It wouldn't have worked, right, I agree with you. Yeah. So now Funker's back in the ring wielding a trash can. Earlier he was brawling with Nick Foley at ringside. He grabbed a chair from the ringside, just threw it up in the air and it donked Mick right in the head. You never know when the Funker is gonna throw a chair. He's just gonna throw fucking whatever you can find to throw a child into the ring, totally dropping the trash can from the ring to the floor, down onto the carcass of Nick Foley. After the s Pork were swinging bake wear. Nothing like uh, I wonder, I wonder what convenience store they went to right for that ship? It's in Queens. Yeah, no, something Queens. Em the Elk's Lodge here. I thought it was the hammer Sign Ball. Now it's Elk's Lodge. I think I'm sorry. I think I got a wrong. Is it Hammersteam? And maybe it was up the aisleway they brought me kind of looks like it. I guess it is. From when we were there, Queens looked a lot like this. You could see like that this is Hammerstein Ballroom. Yeah, so this is Manhattan you know, Manhattan Center, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. When it's ECW you call it the Hammerstein. When it's Monday night raw, you call it a Well, it was a different room, different, yeah, different the Grand right, the Manhattan Center of the Grand Ballroom whatever. Then we try we try to get into They had the Ring of Honor show in this building and we tried to get into that. We try to get into the other one. Yeah, yeah, we get caught. Someone's like, no, dude, you can't go in there. Brother. That's true. Edge looking a spirit dream and the ladder. But treeber Hiptosses they rated our superstar into the ladder. I like how Edge is wearing what cargo pants and ship pretty much? Two thousand and six Street Fight Where for the magicinst Christian In the last E A W Show. I watched it. I watched the show. Oh there you go, we did. I saw that one. It was uh, you know, se Joe win the title? Uh you know, it's a it's a it's a it's a bittersweet for me for Joe to win the title. Yes, certainly, I'm glad he is a world champion again. Up here we go. But see m J F get you know, my boy get get taken down? R Do you think he does this at home with Vicky and the kids, just like the ladder like a necklace and spins around sometimes he just like, like, you know, they're like in it could be like a Sunday afternoon, you know, and they're just like chilling and he's with his grand kids and stuff. And then all of a sudden he says, Oh, I'm just gonna go ahead and go out outside to the garage for a moment, give me a sec and then he just like comes in with the thing around his neck and just starts spinning around the house. I think the only time he's done that at home is when the ceiling fan broke. It's good. Oh, here we go. This is what he was trying to do with hardcore home coming. He's got a ladder, Tommy's holding it in. Oh my god, it's a steel one. He's making sure it won't break. What is the funk? Jesus Christ? Terry's head bounced off the canvas, his edge tip the ladder over, and Funk went for a long, hard bake a funker and they're chanting Terry for that, like, how about how about your chant? Nine one one? Can you imagine? Like a crowd in a Addison Square garden in nineteen seventy one, Bruno San Martino takes a super plex and they chant Bruno for taking the leave bump right in set of fuck. The guy who heard Bruno after the shoulders goes dream It goes a edge for the death. Valley driver Alita sneaks in and kicks Dreamer in the nuts. Terry Funk absolutely worse for wear under the bottom rope in the corner, following over to stomp on his former mentor. So Solus just comes in and kicks her Man and the balls and Beula just sits there like a like a dufus. So far there's an e c W. Chance she's a crack whore back here? Which one they remembered all the hits? Yeah, of course I think they used to chance she's a crack at her when she's mister congeniality. Actually, the e c W fans never forget the hits, right, Oh Jesus barbed wire board? Oh more barbed wire? You know what I am bored? Yeah, the board is in the ring Follian Edge navigating it into place. Up here we go and drop it on. They suplexit down onto the prone carcass of Tommy Dreamer and he's convulsing. No, that's is that Tomy Dreamers that funk now funk had the stripe pants. He's on the floor. Oh yeah, right, of course, ripping the wires, the hair and the shirt of Dreamers. They peel it off of him. I want it. I mean it's like this is I don't know. Oh fuck, did you see that board? The edge of the board hit edge in the face, hit him in the face when you went for the spear? Was it Jesus Christ? That was nasty? Terry's back in the ring on one knee, pummeling Mick Foley with left hands to the to the dome. Dreamer is recovered and now navigating barbarire board into the corner. We want we want fire, we want fire, and Terry Funk have given that to them before in this promotion. So I love how, you know, I love how they don't they have no need like they just what they're doing isn't good enough? No, what's next? Also, you know what ECW was missing too, by the way, was having a big ECW logo in the center of the ring. Yeah, well they had that for barely legal. They look like that though. Fully Yeah, backwards into the Barboier board by both Funk and Dreamer. Look at the way it's hey, hey, Fully, do you remember when you were tired in two thousand exactly, which, by the way, is an angle that Terry Funk was apparently called about participating in and having a roll in. Really, but he went to WCW because they offered more money and you tube things. Surprise, Mick didn't bring that up promoing in this match before this match. This is awesome chances fully takes the risk. Terry else oh fully throws the board right at the approaching Funker and knocks him backward under a heap of wire. Edge has color Terry's under there, deadly slicing his forehead open. I went ahead and grabbed the wire and just sort of cut my face off. What are we getting there? Leader? He has got extra barb wire? Oh great? Oh is she gonna not not a lot though, But he's gonna wrap He's gonna wrap them up. Isn't he that fully has the wire. He's gonna always putting him on his arm. Jesus, it's so stupid. Oh man, the barbier catching on the shirt of Funcus Edge peels the board off of him. We've seen that before, thrown and vulnerable in the center. That fully writs down a barbed wire forum. Look at the cuts on it. Funk's arm as well as the top of his head, only raining down barbed wire pain on Terry and they're behind them, Funker, but you are doing nothing at all. Look at Funk fighting swinging at nothing on his back, bloodied, and Foley goes to work carving his face up with the wire. Jesus, the Funk cell job convulsion. He's going back to my head. Oh my god, that's brilliant. There's what a what a wild set of callbacks? Absolutely, he sing held me, Oh my god, Mick, look at that blood is spurting off. Just ahi, Are they going to remove Funk from the fray or Steve Kerrn Skinner in the suit and Ti there look at him? What a fucking loser leading Terry Funk up the aisleway or WW medical personnel. This is I'm going to lead to a great marching back. Why Sandman is the chant dreamer now with the marciless heads and muh, there it is. Oh, he has a barbed wire bat. He has produced a barbed wire bat? Did uh? Did Hayman book this one too? Yeah? No, I don't think he had as much say so on this one. Is he the first one? Oh? I think he don't to do with it? But I feel like it was lessened. I don't know why I have that sense he was. He was kind of in charge of the first w W E c W one sci fi shows too. Yeah, I remember that I put the bar bar beat on Dreamers and Nuts. Dreamers Nuts always took a beating in e c W and this this night is no exception. Want what now here We go, he's got two he does. He needs double protection for the seasons. Filth bela, not on Tommy. We have men on women violence and Tommy explodes on Foley, just like he exploded on Beola earlier. That's correct. Favor dream I hear Beula calls Tommy Dreamer the innovator of violence in bed will entrapped in the socco claw Edge spears tom right double teeming by Foley and Edge. Instead of covering, Edge wants to commit more violence. He's got his sights on Pulia McGillicuddy, Ah, sister of Michael McGillicutty from Nexus. Really is that was? That was mister Perfect's son. Oh ship ship that's right center center ring. Looking for the pump handle in the position after all the hump handle, Yeah, that's what. And Lena's grabbing her tits there like what the fuck? You can get hot, it's fine, you can get wet, that's fine, you can get hard, nipsy just like here he goes, yeah, yep, I knew that. Funk emerges from the back with a wrapped up forehead and he's got out and two by four with a barbed on it. I called barb I said, get on my god damn four, I'm going to town. Mister Funk went to town, swinging, mister exactly, Mister Funk goes to town. Mister Funk goes to the Hammerstein. Oh Funk comes over the rail as Dreamer catches Edge and Folly with a pair of low blows. Terry Funk re entering the fray with the barbed wire wrapped two by four. He was holding it high like a protest sign. And the way back to the ring bandaged forehead. I bleeding on a bit. Oh, Terry lay it in shots to edge of mc foley with that barbed wire two by four swinging for the five. It's like a New York Yankee. Oh man, all right, at what the hell? Hey, what's he got? Now? What's Terry Funk manipulating? He's gonna be on fire. He's gonna put it on fire and then it's gonna be burning up. I think this is the year too. They started putting. They started putting, uh, making it possible. Oh, yep, there we go. A two by four is on fire. In the video games, you could set the oh fully takes the flame into the gut and across the back fully smoking he's on fire. Oh my god, he shot up fully off the apron through the bare board of the floor. Are they going insane? One more time? They had fully of the fire extinguishers. Oh no, Etch knocks the Funker off the apron and he collapses on a foley in the barb wire. A risky ride for for Terry Funk, no doubt. Back in the ring, Tommy catches edge of the turnaround d d Tasing's think. Oh good, strand a wire and Tommy is choking edge across the throat of the bar wire on the forehead. He's using it almost like a cross face arm sectioned off Leada in to break the hold. Beulah steps in and balls lead it down by the hair and they go nuts. Oh bull biting her? Where's the styles? Call dub easyd wild that they're trying E c W's bad two thousand and six Dreamer snatches lead up to the shoulders violence Innovation Death Valley Driver Jesus Christ. This one would be a hit on DVD. Bomkn Beulah strike the pose center ring from behind, Edge wraps the wire and brings him down with the edge of Maatic. He's gonna spare Beula, you'll a hovering over dreamer and she takes a spare Jesus Christ, he chopped her down, Pinner. He's going to he's gonna stack her up like what he does these days, like he's penetrating her one two three edge and foley within, and then he fucking humps her. He does. I'm bar humper, Oh my god, a hillacious piece of business. Funk are still convulsing in a barbed wire bed, cuddling with me Folly on the outside they are, Terry, find a way to put the wire. Omer's arm shake. How you doing? You want to get a you want to go to Lindy's and get a cheesecake after you think we did it, Terry, I think we did it. We did it? Make? Oh my god, we did it. Make we did it. We went a half. Yeah, we got ahead tonight, we got a head to not. Let's go to Junior's. Zad recovers Mick from the barbed wire. Mick wrote in this book, the fire extendisher makes breathing difficulty in the land and hurt like hell, creating a claw like gouges on my back. But despite my predicament, I'm gratified by the rabbit U c W chance that permeate the building. My night is over. I am now free to lie back and enjoy the rest of the match from the relative comfort of my barb wire bed. This was the I think this was the year too where they they started adding like for extreme rules matches in the game, you could you could set tables on fire. Yes, yes, I remember the games. Yeah, it's wild, which also Edge tried to do in his lastdc AW match. Yes he did. Yes, it's awful, real bad. It's mcfoley extracted from the barbed wire by Edge. He limps up the aisleway with with Leta and Terry still enraptured on a barbed wire mattress. Terry Tommy Dreamer hovers over a bule of a Gillicuddy, the CW banner hanging one last time, and Terry Funk and Nick Foley trying to preserve the the meaning. One more shot of the flunker, almost like he's crucified on barb wire. Yeah, the fuck's going on. It's as if he's wearing a crown of thorns. Look at the blood. Yeah, I know. Convulse and trying his best to extract himself Tommy Dreamer lifting duel off the canvas in his arms. Here's the chant, hold on, le me a clippers, cutting me out, cutting me out, get me clippers. Wow me talking on twenty minutes. But he's been calling there twenty minutes, begging Jesus you. You can't pull off from a little bit. He'd be injured more you the only way to get fucked, only way a free funk is to cut him out with their cutter. Easy. Oh my god, you can't. Did they peel? The funk went out in two thousand and six? To his fact, somehow fuck is back on his feet. Heard it there, You're a legend, brother, mm hm. As for a foley, he felt very satisfied with the match and felt like it definitely vaulted Vince McMahon's skepticism about whether it would be worth doing or come off well. He writes in his book, lucky to have been in a match of such magnitude with the true hardcore legend Terry Funk, and most of all, lucky that I'd have a chance to see Vince McMahon the next day, where I would demand an admission of misjudgment on his part. He had been wrong afterword. Dear hardcore diary, Yes, Mick, you had a very good match, Vince said, so you're admitting you wrong? I asked, Yes, Mick, I was wrong. Just like that. It was over the shortest, most direct admission of error in the history of sports entertainment. One night earlier, I drifted off to sleep, comforted by the anticipated images of a vanquished Vince McMahon, his mouth filled with figurative poop, choking out an agonizing confession of major misjudgment and fundamental wrestling wrongdoing. Want to let down, so brief, so direct, No hemming and high, no anguish, no shit in the mouth, Just a simple yes, Micky was wrong. What a small price to pay for all the frustration his error in judgment had caused me. Show was a big success on pay per view, did almost as well as the first One Night Stand, which was not expected. Ww would go on to steal the One Night's Stand name and slap it on as a ww HE pay per view event, and needless to say, no one ever gave a fuck about it again, right Todd Gordon wrote in his book ECW certainly made its mark. It was a necessary thing for the athletes in the business at that time. They needed a place to establish themselves, create themselves, and that's what ECW was. It was a very creative place. I was attracted to ECW because of the challenge. I was bound to determine that we would not fail as a group of individuals. It was a challenge for us and for Todd Gordon too. It was a rough road to hoe, but I stuck with them and would like to think I gave them a rub, as it was my intention to do so while putting a little scratch on Vince McMahon's arm. I did wherever I could agitate that asshole up north. I was very proud of all the people in ECW. They wanted to do something, to be part of something, and Vince dam sure wasn't going to let them in Wwe well, not right away. They had one, only one choice, so I gave myself one choice also to help make ECW. Eventually Vince got a whiff of ECW and he didn't like it at all. We went in other directions and he had no choice but to accept us as a pain in the ass. I looked back in my time at ECW fondly. It was a marvelous time, and Todd was the one who This is Terry Funk talking. By the way, this is the foreword that Terry Funk wrote for Todd Gordon's book. I should have been clear. It was a marvelous time, and Todd was the one who stepped out onto that diving board and jumped right into the deep end, the one guy who could compete with Vince McMahon and the Scott Williams book Hardcore History. We read this. In two thousand and six, Terry Funk sold the Double Cross Ranch, his home for decades. He and Vicki Funk, his wife and the love of his life, relocated to a smaller house by a nearby lake. He was taking fewer and fewer wrestling gigs, and his retirement looked like it might finally take. However, he resurfaced one more time in two thousand and six, hoping to give one last boost to ECW, in one last memorable performance to the crazy fans he loved so well. BCW was really just a strange, wonderful time in this business that will never happen again. Terry Funk said, these crazy, looney guys caught the imagination of the public across the USA. But hardcore wasn't just hitting a guy with a chair or a frying pan. Hardcore was stuff that was sold properly. It was those wonderful physical matches that were snug, tight, or whatever you want to call it. Those were just physical matches, and those guys were trying to do their best to make people believe or at least gain their respect. Terry Funk said, Paul would definitely deceive the boys if he felt like it was something he had to do to keep BCW going, and maybe that deception was sometimes necessary for that company to continue to exist. So should we condemn Paully? Terry Funk asks, should we set fire to his ass or should we praise him? I'd probably be inclined to singe his ass a little and then brush him off and give him a hug. I'll tell you this, things would be awfully different than the wrestling business today if it were not for ECW. I sure wouldn't be making the money I am at my age. Sabu wouldn't be making the money he makes. ECW was the stage. It was what we all had to have because we had to perform in order to be acknowledged by this business. In a way that would allow us to make something of ourselves. What we just saw was a long way from how Terry Funk and what we just read was a long way from how Terry Funk first phrased it. When he walked into what would become ECW or what was becoming perhaps we should say ECW, it morphed significantly, it changed a lot m but the constant was Terry Funk. He was ECW. ECW was him a long way from how he first framed it. The definition of wrestling evolved as he did. And we closed with this promo that Terry Funk caught all the way back in nineteen ninety three, when this thing was just starting, this ECW leg of his and our journey. He had just won the television title from Jimmy Snook and a steel cage match. Who knew what ECW was about to become. Yeah, Terry Funk let us know that it was not to be forgotten. And I'd like to say something else, is that I picked ECW to wrestle and by choice. This television championship right here means as much to me as being a WWF for WCW champion, Because I'm not a spring chicken can not say you that. And I want to do and finish my career where I wanted to be finished with dignity. I feel up here at the ECW that we've got a bunch of people that want to more than anything else than a lot of young wrestlers, and we've got a lot of treatmentous seasoned wrestlers, but we also have we have the best fans in the world, and that's why I choose to be here. And each number, each week that the ECW is in existence, the fans come out more and more and more because what Todd Gordon is doing and what this ECW is doing is educating you people once again that there is wrestling spelled w R E S t l i n G out there, and it's out there in Philadelphia. So come and see it, because I'll give you one hundred and ten percent and I'll give you my heart, and I know the other wrestlers in this organization will do the same. Yeah, thank you very much. Good for not eggs sucking, dumb lazy man. We did it our way because we love it that way. We love it that way, and I have this wonderful gun feeling and I've had it all my life. When it's time to go, I think it's now, it's time to go.