All right, let’s face facts. The new ECW is a pale shadow of its former self and as the piss poor ratings it pulls proves (I think they’ve been pulling one shares!?!) the show just doesn’t cut it with hardcore fans.

I know it doesn’t cut it for me, aside from John Morrison and Elijah Burke they’ve got no talent that can work a match ECW style. C.M. Punk might make the emo kids swoon, but he doesn’t give you those “oh my God!” moments that were the staple of the original ECW.

Hell, I stopped watching the show for a while and let the Mrs. (who’s the genius who keeps you guys coming here even without any posts about the show) run things.

Even Tommy Dreamer and Balls Mahoney, the last two originals on the roster, barely swing a chair these days and that’s the problem. What I and most of you want (except the people who keep e-mailing marriage proposals to Barbie Blank to us. Learn to read jackasses, We’re not Kelly Kelly) is old school ECW.

We want different. We want an alternative to Raw and Smackdown. High Times magazine once listed watching ECW as being one of the top one hundred things to do when you’re high - we want that ECW back. We want Kristina Laum not Extreme Expose, we want “Prime Time” Brian Lee, not The Boogeyman.

In other words we want strippers not a dance troop, we want wrestlers not “sports entertainers.” And most of all we want the same unpredictable, self-aware, edgy performances that separated ECW from the other products out there. That’s old school.

If the WWE won’t provide it then luckily the Internet can. Beginning today, every Thursday we’ll be finding classic videos of ECW’s hay day and posting them for the world to see in all their glory. If you have clips from house shows are old tapes you want to share, contact us and let us know.

For the Old School Thursday debut I found a good quality video of the program’s intro that many of you will remember from the days when you had to catch ECW on MSG at 2:00 am. It’s from ‘96 and has some hilarious “breaking news” segments with Joey Styles. This clip is what the producers should have been watching when they were putting together the new ECW:

That’s what drew me in in the late 90’s, the old ECW was like Dr Morgus or Chiller Theater. It had that feel to it; that dingy, DIY vibe that anything that becomes a cult classic has.

It also was made from the perspective of a fan, not a booker, and that makes all the difference. Check out this clip that begins with a Chris Jericho vs 2 Cold Scorpio match from a house show:

Yeah. That’s the stuff.

Next week: The Japanese Buzz saw, Tajiri