[1999-05-16-ECW-Hardcore Heaven] Rob Van Dam vs Jerry Lynn

[Superstar Sleeze]

ECW World TV Champion Rob Van Dam vs Jerry Lynn - ECW Hardcore Heaven 1999

 

Kinda crazy to think a mediocre series of matches made Jerry Lynn a star and extended his career for another decade. Jerry Lynn is just so damn generic.

 

This was pretty terrible. It was exacerbated by how fucking long it was. It just dragged and dragged. None of the spots really stood out like the Living Dangerously match. The sunset flip powerbomb through the table and Fonzie taking a chair throw were probably the best spots. The spots just were meaningless. There was no selling at all. It was a total my turn, your turn match with none of the fun spots. There was a tumbling sequence in this that reminded me of the tumbling sequence we saw during Owens/Rollins that got a huge pop and so did this one. It is amazing this is what people associate "wrestling" with. This a barrage of rollups. I thought they were cosplaying Misawa/Kobashi/Kawada, but I think it all stems from that Eddie Guerrero/Dean Malenko series. I think that may have been one of the most influential series of matches of all time.

 

Anyways this sucked.

 

 

 

[G. Badger]

This was a great improvement over their Living Dangerously bout as it actually had a clear beginning with a few holds. Still it was rather disjointed as RVD doesn't seem to know what to do next sometimes and really gets by on his charisma and tremendous athleticism. With that I felt that he is a bit like Brody...he's not the best wrestler but you want to see his matches for one reason or another.

 

Once again it was clear Jerry Lynn held the flow of the bout together and his moves come out of experience and spontaneity where RVD's are mainly trademark moves and variations thereof. I think much of this comes from the ECW fans' expectations. Most of the time they could care less about pacing & psychology and are instead waiting for the next chairshot or table smashing. If both guys didn't have to deal with this then I'm sure these matches would hold up against some of the better Indy matches in Japan at the time.

 

Clearly some folks don't care for Van Dam or Jerry Lynn so, if ye should be one of these fine folks...don't think you're getting anything different here. However, if you like them then this one is recommended if you haven't seen it.