10 Bad-Ass ECW Gimmicks Wasted On Terrible Wrestlers

7. Shane Douglas

Shane Douglas is one of the names most synonymous with ECW, and for good reason. He was the man who won the NWA World Title, then proceeded to declare the title "dead", and named the ECW (Eastern Championship Wrestling) Title as the new World Title. Soon thereafter, Eastern Championship Wrestling became Extreme Championship Wrestling, and that's when his stock with the company really took off. As "The Franchise", Douglas was the foul-mouthed "face" of the company, eventually going on to win the ECW World Title four times, to go with two reigns as the ECW Television Champion. He was getting away with the level of foul language in his promos simply because of where he was. People would go on to say that he couldn't have been a success as a top-tier guy anywhere else (small midcard success in the WWF and in WCW doesn't count) because he wasn't able to cut promos without immediately going off the deep end and cursing up a storm. As we've seen with people like Steve Austin and The Rock, you can cut promos and regularly have the use of some "not child-friendly" language in it, but still get their point across and become very successful wrestling characters. Douglas seemed to build his own "glass ceiling", which is ironic, considering how much complaining he's done through the years about how people like Ric Flair always held people down and kept them from breaking through to the main event. Even if he had been able to tone his promos down, you have to wonder what would have happened in his career. He was a shell of the in-ring performer that he once was. Paul Heyman and ECW were able to have him connect with the mindset of the ECW audiences, giving them everything... while not really giving them much at all.