Heyman on the influences AEW has taken from ECW
While speaking to the Ringer about how Paul Heyman has change professional wrestling, Heyman mentions the influences AEW has taken from ECW:
“AEW is in and of itself RVD, because anyone who watches AEW can quickly conclude the AEW style is based on Rob Van Dam versus Jerry Lynn from 1998, 1999. And then you throw in all the different things that were obviously influenced by Taz, Sabu, the Sandman’s entrance, playing music while the action still goes on—let alone the fact that they continue to use the ‘lights out, lights on’ gimmick, which we debuted at the November to Remember 1995 when I brought back Sabu. The first financially viable opposition to WWE in many years employs styles that we either innovated or popularized during our run.”
He’s not wrong. And the very thing that the anti-AEW crowd likes to complain about, the bringing in of wrestlers from Mexico and overseas, ECW was doing the same thing. Of course, if the internet was as big back then as it is now, you’d have had WWF and WCW fans complaining about ECW, mockingly saying stuff like “Who’s Rey Mysterio and why are they bringing him to shows?”