We’re in September 1999 for “Into the Vault” and for Extreme Championship Wrestling, that means Anarchy Rulz 1999. This event took place in Villa Park, Illinois and drew roughly 6,000. While this was within the final years of ECW, the company was still expanding but it was expanding similar to early IMPACT.
You’d think establishing strong bases throughout the northeast or all along the east coast would be more of the goal than doing shows outside of its region. I don’t know, it just seems easier if travel expenses are level because you’re visiting the same stomping grounds with TV exposure.
Of course, once they lose TNN, going to Illinois, Michigan or Wisconsin makes a little sense as ECW needs to have some presence in difference regions if it’s on the national stage.
The Best
Anarchy Rulz 1999 had a few bangers but most of it was just good, entertaining bouts. Actually, the year hasn’t been bad for ECW. The company just had event that were still in that Hardcore TV/supercard approach when PPV requires something more…structured from start to finish.
It’s a tighter ship with higher stakes.
Lance Storm taking on Jerry Lynn kicked off the proper PPV. While it was a very good match, it’s like “What did you expect?” This was a match that would’ve been a treat later in the show or right in the middle but Anarchy Rulz kicked off with a banger.
When a company starts a PPV off with a strong match, that always gets a thumbs up from me. Why start off with something boring when people paid for the show? Anyway, we also have a three-way dance featuring Tajiri, Super Crazy, and Little Guido!
When I first got to actually follow ECW, it was around this time in 1999. Before that, I kept up with it via Pro Wrestling Illustrated and WOW Magazine but this rivalry between Tajiri and Super Crazy and Sabu made me a fan of the company.
Again, when you get these two, you know what to expect. Adding Little Guido to the mix doesn’t ruin the flavor at all and actually gives us something new because any combination of these guys is a plus from me.
The match was fast-paced on top of having a little too much room to groove and these three filled the time well. Mind you, a three-way dance includes an elimination, so they had no problem making the most of the time and allowing everyone to shine.
Justin Credible taking on Sabu was another strong match on this card. It’s also one of those matches that shows you that Sabu could wrestle straight up or with minimum botches if necessary. It’s just that the botches are what we come to expect from the early raw daredevil style of Sabu since those moments were always caught.
There was a simple enough finish to this Credible-Sabu match. It had a little more time than necessary for these two to work their magic but it wasn’t a gross amount of time or anything. This was a good, digestible match.
The other three-way dance of the evening saw Taz head in to defend his ECW World title against Mike Awesome and Masato Tanaka of the FMW promotion. I actually like how this was done because Tanaka was Taz’s opponent but the champion invited Awesome to join in.
It’s not an “Only in ECW” thing where a wrestler in the crowd gets a title shot but it adds to the “Anything can happen in ECW” vibe of the promotion that others lacked. Taz would be unsuccessful as he was the first eliminated.
The exchange between Tanaka and Awesome would become the thing of legends and lay down the groundwork for their matches going forward. Or rather, they brought the best bits of their FMW work, baked it for an ECW crowd and voila! We’ve got another banger!
The main event saw Rob Van Dam defend his TV title against Balls Mahoney in a match that was surprisingly good. Balls wasn’t known for delivering in a straight up, competitive match—or straight up by ECW’s standards.
While he didn’t do anything too out there or amazing—actually, it was functionally mid or perfectly acceptable—his work here was enough that it could complement RVD, Storm, Lynn, or Credible if they wanted something that wasn’t focused on chairs, tables, and fire.
Mind you, chairs and tables could come into play but no one should just expect there to be tables. For instance, if RVD or Sabu faced 2 Cold Scorpio, I’d expect that chairs will come into play but I’m not necessarily expecting the table each time.
There might be a spot involving the table already at ringside but we’re not halting the match to get plunder from under the ring here. This match was mostly RVD delivering the razzle dazzle but it wasn’t too above Balls’ head to where he was constantly out of place or getting caught with overly-educated feet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9odLgEp_1rc
This match worked and was much better than I expected. It could’ve been placed before the World title match or held its spot and it would be either a great semi-main to lead into the main or a good main event.
I will say that this had more room to groove than it needed. At over 19 minutes, you’d swear ECW was trying to make Balls into the next main eventer waiting in the wings.
You know, just in case more stars get snatched up and ECW makes it into 2002 or 2003.
The Rest
Jazz took on Tom Marquez but that ended in the rare ECW disqualification. The match was less than a minute and while I would like to dive into a DQ in ECW, this isn’t exactly the match to open that door. It’s more of an angle if anything but it’s listed as a match, so it’s in “The Rest.”
I can’t even say that it was bad since it never really got off the ground. It is bad in the sense that this could’ve been handled on Hardcore TV but it was just a minute and didn’t eat up much time of the show.
It would’ve been different if Jazz vs. Marquez was a minute angle-match followed by a related eight minutes of promo or a beat down. That’s an extreme waste of time, there.
Following that is Chris Chetti & Nova taking on Simon Diamond and Tony DeVito. This match pretty much came out of the previous match and ended on a no-contest. It was under four minutes so it wasn’t exactly an extreme waste of time or anything.
I mean, it doesn’t help that Chetti got hurt and DeVito was doing whatever it was that he was doing in this match. Maybe both of them should’ve kept it simple, although Chetti’s thing was more of a bad landing than a poorly executed move from start to finish.
For some reason, Dreamer and Raven defending the ECW Tag Team titles against Rhino and Corino went exactly as I was expecting and I’m not too disappointed about it. I suppose because of how it was presented on the show it seemed like filler but this wasn’t worth running on the PPV at all.
ECW Anarchy Rulz 1999 Verdict: Silver Medal (7/10)
You could the matches in “The Rest” section and not miss anything major while still ending up with a great show overall. Even if you leave those matches, this is still a damn good PPV. There’s enough to enjoy on this show that the bad or mediocre parts get overshadowed.
I’d say that like Heat Wave ‘99, this felt less like what we’ve been getting from ECW PPV and more like a live episode of a three-hour Hardcore TV.
My pick of match of the show is the ECW World title match between Mike Awesome, Taz, and Masato Tanaka. The close runner up is the three-way dance between Tajiri, Super Crazy, and Little Guido.
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