This Sunday, WWE presents One Night Stand 2008, a pay per view that with its gimmick match overkill bears a closer resemblance to the WCW ‘Uncensored’ monstrosities than it’s original extreme offerings.

Since the original ECW One Night Stand in 2005, both the extreme pay per view concept and the very perception of ECW itself have changed almost beyond recognition. The 2005 card gave us The Sandman and Tommy Dreamer vs the Dudleys as the main event – a match reminiscent of such fondly remembered brawls as the climax of best ever ECW pay per view Heatwave 1998.

This year’s primary draw is The Undertaker vs. Edge, both home grown WWE talents who were never in ECW, in a match that WWE credits itself with creating, the TLC. This column sets out to chart the fortunes of the original participants of One Night Stand, and tries to get some answers as to why the ONS became just another identikit WWE show in the following three years.

One Night Stand 2005 began with Lance Storm vs. Chris Jericho. Storm cited the match as being his final – wanting to bookend his career against fellow Hart trainee Jericho – but has since gone on to wrestle sporadically on the independent scene, most notably against Bryan Danielson in Ring of Honour and Doug Williams in 1PW, both in 2006. Another ROH comeback now seems likely, but ONS 2005 was Storm’s last match under the WWE banner.

Jericho went on to a championship programme with John Cena over the Summer of 2005, before ‘retiring’, only making his WWE comeback late last year. Neither man has wrestled in ECW since, although Storm was offered a three-year ECW contract in 2006, which he declined.

Next on 2005’s card was a rematch from Anarchy Rulz 1999 pitting Yoshihiro Tajiri against Little Guido against Super Crazy. Tajiri, an ECW original but also WWE mainstay since 2001 was demoted to C show Heat soon afterwards and  was then released by the WWE (an early Christmas present?) in December 2005. He has since gone on to wrestle in Japan for HUSTLE, and also came back from the second ONS in 2006.

Little Guido had been working for WWE since the end of 2002 under the Nunzio name and essentially ONS was just a blip in the radar for him, as the next week he was back on Smackdown under his WWE name. Guido went on to win the Cruiserweight title twice in 2005, before reforming the Full Blooded Italians circa 2000 team with Tony Mamaluke at ONS 2006. He has since changed names again and jobbed to just about everyone.

Super Crazy entered one of the standout performances of the night, including an awesome moonsault off a balcony, and was subsequently offered a permanent WWE contract! Unfortunately, he, along with fellow Luchadores Psicosis and Juventud Guerrera, were hamstrung by the WWE work ethic and given the degrading ‘comedy’ gimmick of the Mexicools. Crazy did return for ONS 2006, and indeed remains employed by the WWE at present, although his tag team with ‘Hacksaw’ Jim Duggan probably isn’t the best utilisation of his abilities.

Rey Mysterio against Psicosis in an ‘Extreme Luchador’ match – another reprisal of a classic 1995 series, was next on the card. This match occurred in isolation for Mysterio, who would continue to feud with Eddie Guerrero throughout the Summer, and ironically went on to win the WWE Heavyweight Title riding a wave of sympathy for the then-deceased Eddie in the early part of 2006.

Mysterio would go on to defend said belt against Sabu at ONS 2006, and currently enjoys a higher profile (despite being marred by injuries) in the WWE than he ever has. Psicosis on the other hand, would go on to be given the previously mentioned Mexicool gimmick. Psicosis did nothing of note before being released by WWE in October 2006 following his arrest on charges of Grand Theft Auto earlier in the year. While he was under contract for the second ONS, he was not used.

Rob Van Dam, then out of action with a severe leg injury, came out next and cut what was probably the most successful in ring interview of his WWE tenure. Van Dam is an interesting case as the One Night Stand concept was his idea, but he was unable to compete at the original event, instead cutting a ‘shoot’ promo on the WWE and perennial backstage politicians, HHH and JBL. Van Dam went on to win the WWE Championship at ONS 2006, but his push was scuppered by his arrest for recreational pot smoking, causing him to lose both his newly won title, as well as the newly created ECW title, pretty much derailing plans for the new brand of ECW almost right from the beginning.

Van Dam would never enjoy such a sustained top-line push again, and while he would win his match at ONS 2007, he would go on to leave the WWE shortly afterwards and is now helping to train the Ultimate Warrior in a situation that seems to have originated from the most surreal reaches of Van Dam’s mind…

There then followed an impromptu match with Sabu against Rhino. The circumstances behind this bout were also pretty unique, as Rhino was already on the outs with the WWE, having been informed two months prior that his contract would not be renewed following a public fracas with his wife at the Wrestlemania XXI weekend. Sabu, on the other hand, has long been seen as a proverbial loose cannon in an industry full of colourful characters and the fact that he was working with the WWE at all was something of a major surprise.

When you factor in that Sabu had been hospitalised with a career threatening illness and had only made his comeback match the night before at the Hardcore Homecoming event, the very occurrence of the match, let alone its in-ring quality, was something of a question mark in the lead up to ONS.

As it was, the match took place, and it actually landed both men jobs in TNA shortly afterwards, with Rhino turning down an ECW return (and publicly ‘blowing up’ his ECW Heavyweight Title on TNA impact) in 2006, and Sabu enjoying a brief WWE run (including back-to-back shots at all three heavyweight titles over the summer of 2006), before being let go due to personal issues in May 2007.

In retrospect, probably the most eagerly anticipated match at ONS 2005, both proved to be the biggest disappointment and in hindsight also its saddest memory. Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero were supposed to steal the show at ONS with a technical masterpiece but instead the two contested a match that rarely left first gear and was widely looked at as a surprising disappointment at a time when the fan base generally thought neither man could do wrong.

By the time ONS 2006 came around, Guerrero had been dead for seven months, and Benoit was taking an injury leave – something that was later revealed as being a cover up for him having to take time off to deal with the personal issues – apparently those left unresolved that led to the tragic events of June 2007.

Masato Tanaka and Mike Awesome’s somewhat late addition to the ONS 2005 card was the surprise show stealer of the night. Many thought that the then forty year old Awesome had earned himself a job with his gutsy performance, although the WWE ONS DVD release with John Bradshaw Layfield on commentary seems to show that WWE management and their allies were not really all that impressed.

It is also disturbing to note that Awesome, who committed suicide two years later after suffering from depression, took an incredible amount of punishment to the head, while commentator Joey Styles noted, ‘it’s a shame he didn’t kill himself’, after Awesome performed the unfortunately named ‘suicide dive’ manoeuvre.

Tanaka would perform again at the 2006 ONS, but was unable to commit to the ECW brand because of commitments in Japan, while Awesome suffered two blown knees at the 2005 ONS that essentially ended his career.

The main event of the first ONS pay per view ended up being a huge brawl, but the announced participants were The Sandman and Tommy Dreamer against The Dudley Boys. The Dudley Boys were in a similar position to Rhino in that they had been off WWE television since November 2004 and their match at ONS proved to be their last with WWE prior to their contracts running out.

The Sandman was another ECW original who many thought would never find employment in the WWE due to his rampant drinking and penchant for showing up at work plastered. Tommy Dreamer had been working in a semi-retired/road agent capacity since mid 2003, but he was an integral part of the original ECW and one of the keenest supporters of the ONS concept.

The Dudley Boys were released less than a month after ONS, and went to TNA in October of 2005, while the Sandman was rehired for ONS 2006 and enjoyed a short run in WWE until June 2007.

Tommy Dreamer returned to semi retirement following ONS but eventually came back as a full time wrestler for ONS 2006, and remains active in ECW to the present. Amazingly enough, he is the only original participant to be featured in this year’s offering!

So, while the original ECW One Night Stand pay per view was a critical and commercial success, it seems clear that for a variety of reasons, that this sort of event could not sustain itself as a regular occurrence in the WWE’s marketplace. For a start, there are the participants. By now, all of the ‘ECW Originals’ that were hired by the WWE for the event have been let go again, or in some cases, rehired and let go for a second time.

Even wrestlers who had been most recently working for the WWE, men such as Rob Van Dam, Tajiri, all three of the Dudley Boys, and Rhino, have also been released, many in the immediate aftermath of their most recent association with the Extreme brand. In any case, many of the names from the original ONS now work for WWE’s opposition in TNA, thus making an authentic ECW atmosphere especially hard to create.

Sadder still, three of the original participants of ONS are now deceased, and several more are retired.

Still, apart from the continuing participation of Tommy Dreamer, this year’s One Night Stand has one thing in common with the original extremists.

Despite what WWE would have you think, the Tables, Ladders and Chairs match that is the main event has its origins in ECW rather than at Summerslam 2000 – its predecessor was an advertised ‘Tables and Ladders’ match pitting the Eliminators against Sabu and Rob Van Dam at Cyberslam 1997. While ‘Chairs’ were not an official stipulation, being a Sabu match, there were bound to be some involved!