20 Mind-Blowing Facts About ECW

By Jamie Kennedy /

18. TNN Didn't Even Advertise ECW's TV Shows

When ECW signed a national television deal with TNN in 1999, many people inside the company felt that this was the start of something special. The promotion had been able to run occasional Pay-Per-View events since 1997, but national TV was considered the Holy Grail for any wrestling outfit, and now ECW had it. Unfortunately, securing such a spot on television would prove to be more of a hindrance to ECW than a benefit, and it's actually something Paul Heyman attributes as helping to kill the promotion rather than making it bigger. For some reason, TNN (now known as Spike, previous home of TNA programming) didn't really seem to want ECW once they had it. In 2000, TNN signed a deal with the WWF to host Monday Night Raw, meaning they cared even less about the ECW show. For whatever the reason, those and such as those in charge of the network didn't care for the ECW product, or at least that's how it seemed. TNN regularly failed to even advertise that ECW shows were on, which is obviously not the ideal way to promote viewership.