I am torn on ECW. Looking back, most of its angles were complete trash, with a few exceptions (like Sandman vs Raven). A lot of the wrestlers were just complete garbage both in the ring and from a charisma standpoint, so they had to basically cripple themselves to get a crowd reaction. There was some legitimate talent, obviously, but a lot of them were just awful (for every Jericho you had 3 guys like Balls Mahoney).
The raunchy shit was definitely a product of its time and did lead to an edgier product in WWF and later WCW, but in hindsight a lot of that stuff was just awful (from all 3 companies). I tried re-watching a Raw from 1999 a few weeks back and 75% of it was complete trash. From what I remember, ECW would be even worse.
ECW also lead to popularizing hardcore wrestling, which lead to more hardcore, which lead to death match wrestling and guys crippling themselves to get over (like Darby). I like wrestling but I hate seeing guys do jumps off of 15 foot ladders just to do jumps off of 15 feet ladders. That shit is fun to watch the first time, but after you've seen it 100 times it desensitizes you to it. That's what ECW lead to by doing that shit every show. I'd like to blame ECW on creating the work rate marks and Young Bucks but I don't think I can do that
I was super young when I became aware of ECW. I’m fairly certain I saw my first luchador match, courtesy of my grandfather, from an ECW event he had traded tape for. I was blown away by how sick the spots were. Didn’t get to see these often but it was always a treat when I did.
These ECW tapes were also my introduction to Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit who both top my all-time greats list. Imagine my shock when these two dudes started appearing on the WCW tapings.
I will agree with you though, the longer ECW went on, the more the product seemed to dilute. I’m still a huge fan of classic ECW and have read every article and watched every interview about it since, but if there has to be an epicenter where work rate exceeds what a normal human being should put in, it definitely starts at ECW. I am aware of the scene in Japan, and as large/popular as they might have been, they don’t share the same lineage.
I like deathmatch wrestling. I’ve been to handfuls of GCW shows, but man, all of these dudes and ladies have expiration dates written on them clear as day. If that’s what they wanna do, more power to them. Nick Gage has said he is a proficient technical wrestler, but no one is going to pay their 20 dollars to see that. Barely anyone pays 20 dollars to see him kill/kill himself.
I think the reason we see so many of these young guys, Darby included, killing themselves is that the wrestler pool is so large nowadays, there’s so many ways to watch wrestling, so many different promotions to watch… but not enough people watching. These guys gotta stand out somehow, and everyone will stop to watch a train wreck. Difference is, the first coffin drop I saw floored me. The 50th one I saw - why?