The Wrestling Observer reported that backstage at the Monday Night Raw taping on 6/23/97, Rob Van Dam and Sabu were not happy with what WWE creative had booked for them. Sabu complained about having to do a double count out finish with Flash Funk and wanted to go over in the match. RVD was scheduled to put over Jesse James Armstrong, aka Road Dogg, via count, who was primarily losing matches at the time. RVD commented that his losing to James would be equivalent to Bret Hart coming into ECW and losing to one of their job guys. This drew the ire of WWE officials, Gerald Brisco in particular, who found it insulting that Van Dam would compare himself to Bret Hart. There were also complaints about Van Dams ego as he believed he was a bigger star than he actually was at the time. Its certainly understandable from a promotional point of view because Van Dam would have made ECW look inferior if he lost to a jobber. However, there were no count outs in ECW, and since Van Dam was a heel, a simple promo talking about how he wasn't used to WWE rules could have given him a pass. This was thought to have almost killed the invasion angle as it was believed that Paul Heyman saved it. The plan was to have aweekly ECW presence on Raw to build to a match at Summer Slam that year with Tommy Dreamer and Sandman working Jerry Lawler and Rob Van Dam. The benefit for ECW was to receive some promotion for their sophomore pay-per-view, Hardcore Heaven. However, that night in Detroit was the last time ECW was seen on WWE television. Apparently, extreme egos did kill the deal after all.
Atlee Greene is a freelance writer for various sites, including ForcesOfGeek.com, Gerweck.net, CamelClutchBlog.com, and WhatCulture.com. He is also a former independent professional wrestler and promotes shows in the Massachusetts area.
