10. He Was ECWs Champion For Life...
WWE.comAsk any fan of my generation about wrestling and the conversation will invariably turn to ECW. A battle-scarred, renegade indy promotion that somehow survived (and thrived) despite being perennially caught in the crossfire of the Monday Night Wars, ECW was unique, awe-inspiring and different. Positioning itself as the punk rock equivalent of the little company that could, Extreme Championship Wrestling was wrestling stripped right back, often to nothing but blood, guts and beer stains. Classy, former NWA World Champions had no business appearing on an ECW card and, in fact, most ECW fans would have had zero interest in a scientific wrestling match anyway, but that didnt stop Terry Funk becoming the companys biggest star. Funk, who was by then into his 50s, lent his name, credibility and drawing power to the fledgling group of bloodletting b*stards and, in return, they beat the seven bells of Holy Hell into him, night after night. In the ECW arena, Funk was set on fire, carved up like a Christmas turkey and tangled in barbed wire. He was bludgeoned with chairs, put through tables and beaten with barbed wire wrapped baseball bats. He was sliced open with glass, impaled on thumbtacks and thrashed to within an inch of his life. ...And lets get something straight; he wasnt a washed-up old pug like Randy The Ram Robinson in the 2008 movie The Wrestler, who only did it because needed the money. Funk could have gone home any time he wanted to. ...But he didnt. Terry Funk gave of himself; he gave his blood, his guts and his pride to get ECW off the ground and to help turn it into something that the fans could believe in. He did it for the business. You talk about somebody giving something back? Thats what Terry Funk did (and has always done), the hard way. The stars of ECW would not have gone on to the continued success (and dependable livings) that many of them have enjoyed, had Terry Funk not put their company on the map in the first place. He even headlined the promotions first Pay Per View, Barely Legal, in 1997, defeating Raven for his second ECW World Heavyweight Championship (his third, and to date final, World Championship run overall).
WWE.comDuring one of Terrys (many) retirement matches, ECW hefe Paul Heyman presented Funk with a special championship belt, which made him the Lifetime Champion of ECW (the belt was actually paid for by the other wrestlers, as a one-of-a-kind gesture of respect). Today, ECW is no more, but their deranged and delirious rebel song has passed into legend. Although the ECW arena now stands silent (not really it is used all the time, even appearing in the 2006 movie Rocky Balboa), it probably still smells of stale sweat and dried blood...And most of it is probably Terry Funks.