Talk about it here.

I don't remember seeing this at the time. I guess I was pretty WCW-oriented at this stage. But it was a hell of a lot more intense than your average wrestling "debate." Lawler and Heyman seemed to be legit seething at one another. It's hilarious that Lawler took on this role given all the ridiculous shit he did in Memphis over the years.

This is amazing! I really do think these two loathed each other. Throwing some insane shoot bombs on each other that are way below the belt. Pretty awesome. I love that Lawler asks his friends to come down and no one does. Everything about this segment was perfect. Honky saying Lawler's friends simply couldn't hear him back there made me laugh out loud!

I can imagine the IWC at the time going crazy over this. I've no idea how much of this they planned to do but it comes off like things got out of hand. It would've been awesome if a group of WWF midcarders came down and had a huge brawl with the ECW guys. But Lawler asking for backup and nobody appearing was pretty good too.

This really should be talked about more as it was almost like the predecessor to CM Punk 2011 stuff. Lawler and Heyman give their best insults to each other and actually use the word shoot a ton. Lawler says that Heyman wouldn't have an ECW if his parents wouldn't have financed it and Heyman gets in some shots on Lawler's regionalism in Memphis. Glorious back and forth and ECW's roster comes out to back up Paul but Lawler doesn't get a response when he calls back his friends.

I loved this at the time. When WWF Raw was in north east markets I was always hoping ECW guys would show up. Lawler and Heyman going at it is just fun TV. Lawler lets everyone know Paul E still lives at home with his parents. Lawler finds out the hard way he doesn’t have any friends.

This was almost hard to watch due to how low this gets. Heyman was at least to some degree playing a chracter while Lawler, I think, just did a 95% shoot promo about his feelings regarding ECW and Vince giving them time on Raw to promote themselves.

I always think people overstate how much animosity Lawler had for ECW.

 

Remember, this is the guy who was involved in the greatest worked shoot of all time with Andy Kaufman. The man knows how to make you feel like its a shoot when its not, and he revels in it.

Plus if they really wanted this to be a shoot, they would have put Cornette (my fuzzy memory of this is that he was only involved in helping Lawler out during the Dreamer match a month later from this) in Jerry's place.

Paul is in the top shelf of all time great promos in my opinion. There's a dozen or so in that league, but his ability to passionately get his point is peerless.

I always think people overstate how much animosity Lawler had for ECW.

 

Remember, this is the guy who was involved in the greatest worked shoot of all time with Andy Kaufman. The man knows how to make you feel like its a shoot when its not, and he revels in it.

Yeah, Lawler recently did an interview where he said that his hatred of ECW was all a work. He may have disliked Heyman, but he had no ill feelings about ECW.

This feels like a Memphis angle all the way, including the way Lawler composes himself in general. Lawler compares the size of Spectrum WWF crowds to ECW Arena crowds, and Paul immediately gets personal by pointing out Lawler had nothing to do with any of that. "How ya doin' at the seesaws in Louisville, Jerry? You own sons don't call themselves Lawler!" "If wasn't for your Mom and Dad who financed this bunch of crap, you wouldn't be anything!" The ending sort of sees Jerry revert to his WWF clown act, as he calls out "all his friends" to come help and no one responds. Still an awesome segment that teetered on the brink of getting totally out of control.

This is tremendous. Lawler & Heyman go scorched earth on one another. Sandman & Dreamer get heated & try to fight Lawler in a couple of fun moments. Dreamer actually ends the debate by breaking the podium. I can't even describe all of the amazing things these two throw at each other. In an awesome touch, Lawler invites wrestlers from the WWF roster to come down & help him fight the ECW contingent. No one shows up making him eat his words. I loved that. Great segment that had some much needed chaos that you wouldn't normally get out of RAW during this period outside of Austin.

Awesome debate! This is a good use of the shoot promo and creating the feel of a worked shoot. I thought Lawler was amazing and definitely side with him. Him having no friends was great. I do wish there was a better finish. It just kinda ended. Either beat him up or have him run away.