An incredible saga.
Tazmaniac and Sabu couldn’t have been two more different people, but they made a great team. Both hard to read in different ways. Sabu was eclectic, Taz was very serious and about his business. Sabu no-showed the Three Way Dance event to go take bookings in Japan. Paul Heyman fired Sabu publicly. Vowed he’d never set foot in ECW again.
The Tazmaniac dropped the gimmick and became a hard nosed, stone cold shooter. He became Taz. He violently dumped everyone on their heads. He submitted everyone. Everyone was a victim in the Path of Rage from Mikey Whipwreck to 911. But Taz remained bloodlusted because he wanted Sabu. He wanted him reinstated, he wanted him back across from him in a ring. He wouldn’t take no for an answer.
He called Sabu out for an entire year and on this night, at November to Remember, the rubber met the road. Taz put ECW founder Tod Gordon in the Tazmission. He gave Paul Heyman a T-Bone Tazplex. Everyone was a victim until the lights went out and Sabu finally made his return.
Barely Legal was ECW’s first foray on PPV. There were two major hooks. Terry Funk vying for the world title as the old gunslinger, and Sabu vs Taz, a match two years in the making. By that point it felt like the fight of the century.
When Sabu FINALLY pulled up on Taz at November 2 Remember ‘96.
This was cinema.