Professional wrestling legend and former seventeen times WWE Hardcore Champion Tommy dreamer who is a former two times ECW World Heavyweight Champion recently looked back at the ECW One Night Stand pay per view event of 2005. He claimed that Vince McMahon did not want Paul Heyman at the event.
The original ECW had a short run of nine years and was defunct in 2001 after getting bankrupt. The rival promotion WWE purchased ECW at the bankruptcy of the promotion. But in a very short amount of time the promotion became quite successful and extremely popular among the fans.
Tommy Dreamer Reveals Vince McMahon Did Not Want Paul Heyman At ECW One Night Stand 2005
ECW thought the world of professional wrestling what actual hardcore wrestling was. It became popular because of its hardcore wrestling style. The death of the promotion was heartbreaking for its fans.
Keeping eye on its popularity, WWE tried to resurrect the promotion in 2005 with a pay per view event called ECW One Night Stand. It became so popular that WWE decided to run the promotion as a parallel brand to RAW and Smackdown.
WWE event started the promotion from 2006 but unfortunately it failed. It was nothing like the original ECW, in spite it was more of a development territory of the main roster of WWE. Vince McMahon could never treat ECW as a major show. No wonder why it failed.
Paul Heyman, the boss of ECW started to work in WWE after the death of the promotion. During the One Night Stand pay per view events, he appeared in his traditional Paul E. Dangerously outfit and it was an amazing Nostalgia for the fans of the promotion.
But the excitement of the resurrection of ECW was the short lived as fans quickly realised that WWE does not have big plans for it. And with back to back failures, Vince McMahon decided to close the show and start NXT.
Tommy dreamer who is a former two times ECW World Heavyweight Champion recently spoke to Busted Open Radio where he looked back at the ECW One Night Stand pay per view event of 2005. He claimed that Vince McMahon did not want Paul Heyman at the event. He said;
“I always got along with him from early ECW when we were having secret meetings. And I mean Vince is the first person I ever heard in professional wrestling. He was doing the commentating when I first saw my first ever match. I remember the first day when I actually went to WWE with the whole Alliance and Paul was giving Vince [an earful] and Vince was kind of having a heated discussion. He looks at me and he’s like, ‘how did you deal?’
“And I go, ‘he’s your problem now.’ So that was like kind of set the tone…I’ve had, I mean one argument with him but the rest were and for a lot of people it’s pick and choose because the guy is so, so busy. But I’ve had nothing but great experiences with Vince. I worked in the office, I literally shared the office next to him, which the only thing I didn’t like was he would keep his office so cold, hence, my office would be cold. And I’m a heavyset guy, I normally like the cold.
“I’ve worked out with him. I’d be working out and people would be leaving the gym when he walks in. And I would be the only one there working out with him. And I also saw him when he just had his quad surgery and he [had the] double, double cast in his leg. And he’s in a wheelchair that’s kind of sticking straight out both legs, and he’s still working out.
“And also even when I returned, and even when I before when I left, I had great meeting with him about why I felt I wanted to go. And even when I came back like or even when every time I would visit. I always have fun. And like Mark [Henry] said he’s a manly, man, as well as like, he likes to poke jokes and play jokes. I do too.
“And like I would always like you know, set up. Either I’m eating something that Vince sees and he would just be disgusted about what I would eat or, you know, kind of being a little bit on the heavyset side. So just stuff like that. And I’ve also hung out with Vince after shows where, you know, I know the business is different, but Bully, Mark myself and we signed the contract.
“My biggest time would be the resurgence of ECW and John Laurinaitis as head of talent relations. I worked for John, and that big push for it was with Johnny through Shane, but everything has to be through Vince McMahon’s approval. And Johnny basically comes in and then I get called into the big office. And they basically tell me that I’m in charge of it. I’m writing the whole show. I want this to be different.
“And I’m, it’s just me, [Vince says] do whatever the hell you want. hire whoever the hell you want in this again, just for the first ECW One Night Stand, you’re writing it, you’re doing it and I was very, very, like, wow. And I remember, like sitting back in my office, and I called Beulah. And I was like, ‘I can’t believe this. Like they finally see it in me.’ And like I had, like this great nirvana. But back into the meeting.
“He’s like, ‘this is all you blah, blah, blah. The only caveat, we don’t want Paul involved.’ Paul was at the time hated, sent to – He wasn’t even really doing OVW stuff. He was just, he was in the doghouse for whatever reason, I don’t know. And I’m sitting by myself, I’m in total control. I could have been a jerk and kept Paul out. But I’m saying to myself, how do you keep Paul Heyman out of something ECW. And I always knew me and Paul worked great together.
“And I then had to devise a plan how I had a go to Johnny, for hey, how do I navigate this through the political waters? How do I get Paul Heyman booked, and on this ECW show. And he basically helped me and basically, again went to Vince and I was like, ‘Vince, you said, I’m in charge. Everything’s good. But Paul has to be on it.’ And he was just like, ‘you know, Paul was shipped off to nana land.’ But he was like, ‘if that’s what you want. You got it.’ And me and Paul got to work together.
“Paul [at the] last minute made a change to the pay per view because Vince also wanted Steve Austin involved and Paul’s changes and he was always being very, very politically correct, which he never had to be with me. [Paul said], ‘But like if you don’t want to change it, you can do it.’ But I was like, ‘Paul, listen, number one, like you’re putting a promo in for yourself, and how could Paul Heyman not do a promo and how is that not going to benefit the show?’ And then we had the whole involvement with JBL and the WWE guys. The show came off without a hitch.”
H/T to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription