By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

ECW HITS

Christian vs. Benjamin: ECW got off to a good start this week with this match between Christian and Shelton Benjamin. This was clearly the best match of the show. Both men worked hard to put on a good match. It featured good wrestling action and told a story as Benjamin took advantage of the early distraction from Vladimir Kozlov, and ultimately injured Christian's arm. There were a few really good sequences like when Benjamin did his patented leap to the top rope, only to have Christian block him, knock him down, and hit a great missile drop kick, or when moments later Benjamin again did his leap, successfully hitting a huge single arm DDT. I have mixed feelings about the end. I am a fan of Benjamin and after the debacle on his first ECW with Yoshi Tatsu, it is good to see him booked strong again. However, I don't see the point in having the #1 contender for the ECW Championship lose clean (the distraction from Kozlov was too early in the match to call it an unclean finish) at this point.

Ezekiel Jackson Week 2: The second week of Ezekiel Jackson on ECW was much better than the first. This interview with Gregory Helms worked well. It was short and to the point and Jackson delivered. I'm glad WWE actually brought up his working for The Brian Kendrick in the past, as they totally ignored it last week. I also liked how Jackson scoffed at the notion that he has to step out of Kendrick's shadow. If he can improve in the ring, he definitely has the size and presence to become a star.

ECW MISSES

Rest of the Card: Other than the opening match, the other four matches were not good. That isn't to say that all of them were bad, but they certainly didn't add up to anything good. Tatsu vs. Paul Burchill was going along fine until Tatsu slipped. These things happen, but it did distract from the match. Also, it was too short ot amount to much anyway. Zack Ryder vs. Goldust was solid, but also too short to amount to much. The crowd seemed to be into the first two matches of the show, but they were lifeless for this match and for the rest of the show. Ryder has been having good showings on Superstars, but Goldust hasn't been used well to get the fans behind him. So, they were sitting on their hands, and then the match was over. Shaemus' squash over the jobber was fine. His Rock Bottom into the backbreaker finisher is awesome. I was surprised the match happened so late. I thought the main event would go longer. It is probably better that it didn't go longer than 4 minutes, as it was not fun to watch.

Tiffany Flirts with Reks: First it was Ricky Ortiz, not it is Tyler Reks. Flirts might be a bit strong, but Tiffany definitely had eyes for Reks. It was a brief tease of some possible attraction between the two, but I hope it only remains a tease. I guess it really doesn't matter, but I would like to see a woman authority figure in WWE who doesn't get married to a wrestler. Tiffany doesn't have to have an on screen romance with a wrestler.

Too Much Happening: This episode felt like the early one hour TNA Impacts from a few years ago, and that is not good. There were five matches. Raw and Smackdown usually only have six matches in twice the time. Superstars feels right when it has three matches in one hour. Five is too many so they become short and don't accomplish much. Shaemus' squash was the right length, but it should have taken Kozlov longer than 4 minutes to beat the ECW Champion. Burchill vs. Tatsu and Ryder vs. Goldust would have benefitted from having a few more minutes each. Throw in a recap video to start the show, the Ezekiel Jackson interview, the scene with Tiffany and Reks, the Raw Rebound, and a recap of the Hurricane from last week (shouldn't the announcers recognize the Hurricane who was around for a long time before and even feuded with the Rock at one point?). It was a lot of content crammed into one hour.

Champion & Challenger Lose: It was good to see WWE keeping both the ECW Champion and his challenger strong heading into Night of Champions. I hope you could tell I was being sarcastic. They did the same thing last week on Smackdown when Jeff Hardy lost on the same night that CM Punk would have lost if the match didn't get thrown out after it was interrupted. I don't understand. It seems like they are planning on changing the Title match at the PPV to a triple threat with Kozlov, but I don't want to see that. If they aren't doing that, why are they focusing on Kozlov instead of actually building to Christian vs. Dreamer?

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's WWE Hits & Misses Specialist, providing his point of view for Raw, Smackdown, ECW, and Superstars each week. Email him at jmezz-torch@sbcglobal.net.

For another view from the original Hitlist author, compare Jason Powell's views to mine by visiting prowrestling.NET's "Hitlist" section here.

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