10 Forgotten Wrestling War Moments

6. RVD refuses to do the job on WWE Shotgun Saturday Night

WCW might not have gotten their ECW invasion in 1997, but WWE certainly did. 

Simultaneously freshening up a stagnant WWE product and promoting ECW’s maiden pay-per-view – Barely Legal – it was short-lived, but served its purpose. 

The inter-promotional rivalry would sort-of continue following Barely Legal, with Rob Van Dam rebranding himself ‘Mr. Monday Night’ and showing up on Raw (managed by Jerry Lawler). It was a good showcase for RVD and ECW, but things soured rather quickly when The Whole F’N Show refused to do the F’N job for Jesse James on an episode of Shotgun Saturday Night. 

Van Dam felt like it wouldn’t benefit him (as a main-eventer in ECW) to lose to a lower-card WWE guy, even if it was suggested that he would be counted out and not pinned in the middle. 

His refusal to do the honours rubbed backstage officials the wrong way, with Heyman attempting to smooth things over while simultaneously egging his own star on. 

This pretty much killed Van Dam’s WWE run and the company were at pains to remind him about who the bosses were when he went to negotiate with them a few years later.