By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

ECW HITS

Burchill vs. Hurricane: This was a good match and a fitting end to what has been a solid to good mid-card feud for ECW. Paul Burchill has improved, and Hurricane has shown that he appears to be back fully healthy after his injury issues. Burchill is never going to have super exciting matches, but he can have good physical matches which is what this was. I particularly liked how he played his role as growing more and more frustrated as the match proceeded when he couldn't finish off Hurricane. Hurricane looked good for his part. The match built well to the end with the big spot from the top rope as Hurricane hit a crazy spinning neck breaker to get the win. The Burchills' reaction to being done with ECW was good too.

Raw Rebound: Yes, I am actually giving the Raw Rebound a Hit. Although technically speaking, this video package wan not titled the Raw Rebound. It was a replay of the great video from Raw of the classic moments from over the years of WWE in Madison Square Garden. That led into a nice recap of the big main event from Raw at MSG, adding to the big moments of the original video. It was nicely done.

Punk & Regal vs. Christian & Truth: I don't really get having CM Punk and R-Truth on ECW this week (more later), but I liked the main event tag. I want to focus on two things. The first is how the match told a consistent story throughout. The heels worked over Truth's leg to weaken him during the match. It was a good strategy that actually paid off in the end. Truth did ultimately get a hot tag to Christian which fired up the crowd, however when he reentered the ring a few minutes later to try to lend a hand, he hurt himself again, which caused the referee to be distracted, allowing Regal and Punk to get the win over Christian. The second thing I want to focus on is that ending, which was very well executed as Christian attempted to hit the Killswitch on Punk, only to take the Knee Trembler from Regal, setting up the GTS by Punk, which Christian sold very well. It was a strong ending to a good match.

ECW MISSES

Brand Split Disintegrating: WWE has thankfully done a good job this year after the last draft of keeping the brands split. At the very least it has been a vast improvement over last year when the brand split meant nothing. That makes something like Undertaker's first appearance on Raw in a year more meaningful. However, the split has been blurred quite a bit lately, particularly starting with the build towards Bragging Rights. That was done in the context of a Raw vs. Smackdown themed PPV, so it made some sense. I don't really see how building towards a simple Survivor Series traditional elimination tag match justifies a random appearance by CM Punk and R-Truth. I enjoyed their involvement in the show. However, I don't like the trend and I hope it doesn't continue. On a side note, how do you have CM Punk on ECW and not announce it ahead of time? If you insist on blurring the brand split lines, at least take advantage of it to try to get a bit of a ratings boost for ECW.

Archer's Intensity: I don't think one adjective is enough to really define a character. For three weeks now we've been told that Vance Archer is intense. Anything else we should know about him? When you introduce a new character cold like this it can be difficult to establish who he is. He looks strong in the ring destroying jobbers in about a minute, but that does nothing to help him connect with the audience. It could be worse. He could be playing Guitar Hero. But, they have to do something to make us connect with him in some way other than just being intense.

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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