[2000-04-20-CWF] Steve Corino vs Tommy Dreamer

[soup23]

We get a long stall process to start this. Again, it is interesting to see in contrast to ECW but it did get a little long in the tooth to watch. The match was fine but I really am souring on Dreamer as a worker. He seems content to just do the plodding walk around brawl when I know from his interviews and fandom that he could create much more interesting stories within the matches. Corino blades and Dreamer does more bullshit by doing the worm. It pops the house but not me. Corino’s heat segment is brief and it isn’t before long when Dreamer avoids a drop toe hold onto the chair and then hits a chairshot of his own for the win. Disappointing. **1/2

[Loss]

I cracked up at Corino getting heat by promising to ban alcohol when he has full control of ECW. I enjoyed this quite a bit more than Chad. Entertaining as hell. Corino is an awesome staller. Dreamer stinks, but Corino is good enough at doing this that it doesn't matter. Dreamer's obsession with his home company is psychotic. After the long stalling, this escalated into a really nice main event, made almost entirely by Corino. The psychology here is actually spot on, as it gives Corino a valid reason to bump and juice and the babyface a valid reason to walk tall. I just wish it was just about any other babyface. ***1/4

[Migs]

Weird to hear Dreamer come out to something other than Man in the Box. Maybe some in-joke?

 

Corino's promo is spectacular, particularly the kissing up to Taz ("favorite ECW champion ever!"). Really, his performance through the whole match is masterful. Dreamer is good too, although in the weird homophobic babyface bully act that doesn't hold up well. The WWF imitating is also pretty lame, but the crowd eats it up. If this is Corino with a less broken down baby face, this might have been great, although maybe Corino wouldn't have pushed to do so much if he wasn't in there with Dreamer.

[GSR]

Corino grabs the mic and he’s not happy that the crowd cheered for Tommy more than they did him. “The guy that went on WWF Smackdown trying to defend ECW and screwed it up!” He’s sure the Triple H is thanking him right now for the clubbing he gave Tazz, his favourite World Heavyweight champion! Dreamer is a 29 year old disgrace and has been hit in the head so many times he doesn’t know the difference between Tazz and Triple H! Tommy may claim to be the saviour of ECW, but in fact he’s the saviour, and when he’s sitting on top as the World champion there will be no more hardcore wrestling, no more foul language, no more children allowed in the ECW Arena and no more alcohol served at ECW events (that one doesn’t go down too well). He then challenges Dreamer to an ECW ‘old school’ style match, which means no punching, no kicking, no pulling of hair, and definitely no trying to beat him infront of this crowd like he does on TV every week! Corino pulls out a $100 bill (two weeks of the audience’s salary!) and bets that Dreamer couldn’t even do a textbook drop toehold if his life depended on it. He hands the ring announcer the bill and tells her not to steal it and go and spend the dollars on crack! Dreamer responds and says that he can’t punch then, he can’t pull hair, he can’t kick, “what about kicking you in the nuts?” “Noooooooooooo!” “there goes half my act!”. As he has just been to the WWF to defend ECW’s honour, he suggests that they do a little ECW/a little WWF action, “that stupid old school crap” he wants to do. Corino shouts “deal” and Dreamer promises not to punch, kick, pull his hair and do anything bad.

 

A handshake to start this one. Dreamer with a go behind and after not being able to escape Corino heads to the ropes for the break. He claims a pull of the tights but the referee is not having any of it. Fireman’s carry takedown and again Corino is scrambling for the ropes. Tommy’s had enough already, says that this wrestling sucks and that Corino should be called ‘the King of Boring Crap’, before getting the crowd to start a “boring, boring” chant. Dreamer gets the better of the next exchanges and now Corino wants them to go at it amateur style. He tells him to get on all fours, Corino gets behind him, Tommy turns around and sees him and is back to his feet. “Homo, homo” chant now. Some more talking on the mic and Dreamer says he said he would wrestle him, not have sex with him! Corino tells him that he’s no homo, has never sucked a cock and offers to get on all fours himself. Tommy thinks about amateur wrestling him, then just punts him in the stomach instead. Corino ducks a clothesline, but his crossbody is caught and Dreamer with a fallaway slam. Knife edge chops and Tommy mimics Ric Flair with a really bad strut and the face first bump. The match heads to the outside and Corino gets the crowd to move as though he’s going to throw Dreamer into them, however he just throws him straight back inside. As Corino is dancing on the floor proud of himself, Dreamer with a dropkick through the ropes to the back and he can finally get hardcore! He rams Corino’s head into a couple of metal pillars and wallops him over the head with a tray busting him open. They return to the ring, drop toehold by Tommy and he collects the $100 from the ring announcer. Not happy with just mimicking Flair, we get a ‘People’s elbow’, the Road Dogg’s ‘juking and a jiving’ and the World’s worst ever ‘Worm’. Piledriver onto a chair but Dreamer misses an elbow off the middle and lands on it himself. Leg lariat by Corino for two. He teases hitting Dreamer with a chair only to sit on it and slap on a reverse chinlock. Tommy escapes and ties Corino in the ‘tree of woe’. DDT soon after and the ‘Innovator of Violence’ comes out on top.

 

I’ve not watched Guido/Mikey from the same show yet, but after seeing Corino/Nova on that MCW card and now this, there is a huge disparity between how the ECW stars work on their own house shows compared to when they work elsewhere. Not that I didn’t enjoy this, and due to the efforts of Corino it was an extremely entertaining watch, but there was a ton of schtick, stalling and comedy involved here. They don’t take many bumps, and although Corino bladed, no hard weapon shots and certainly no chair shots to the head, just the back. Not that I’m complaining about that, as I definitely wouldn’t want them to be doing what Masato Tanaka does on random house shows, just interesting to see them in a different environment.

[Moonsault Marvin]

Corino had a funny opening promo, but this went downhill from there. Dreamer wouldn't stick to the "old school" rules, so this turns into a long comedy match with chair spots. I'm not much of a Tommy Dreamer fan, and I found Dreamer's imitations painfully unfunny. I was just ready for the match to end. Poor match.

[Edwin]

This is as ECW as it gets outside of ECW. I'm not particularly fond of Dreamer, but I dig Corino.

 

The match was rather forgettable imo, but I did dig Corino's stalling early on. Plus him faking chair shots on Dreamer twice and then sitting in the chair and grabbing a chinlock.