9 Worst Botches In ECW History

Remember that guy who was the recipient of the Awesome beating at The Night The Line Was Crossed in 1994? Well, in March 1995 J.T. Smith was wrestling The Sandman at a Philadelphia live event, and attempted a tope con hilo – a suicide dive – to the outside of the ring. He’d just returned from a couple of months off due to a nagging injury, and believed that he had something to prove.

It would have been nice if that something had been, “can execute a flawless tope without catching his toes on the ropes and landing head first on the floor of the ECW arena”, but it wasn’t, and he couldn’t. The large swelling on the side of his head – about the size of a softball – was the outward manifestation of the serious concussion he received as a result.

We were unable to find video or pictorial evidence of the botch or the injury, so we’ll leave you with this positive outcome… the botch and the injury were used to get Smith over, the first time anyone had really tried, let alone succeeded. Heyman’s angle was that Smith had suffered brain damage and believed himself to be Italian, a common symptom of post-concussion syndrome. Smith formed a stable called the Full Blooded Italians, playing up to the angle by pretending to botch other moves semi-regularly, speaking in a cod-Italian accent and acting the amiably arrogant heel. The ECW crowd still heckled him, but this time it was out of love.