CyberSlam (1998)

The event featured wrestlers from pre-existing scripted feuds and storylines. Wrestlers portrayed villains, heroes, or less distinguishable characters in the scripted events that built tension and culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches played out on ECW's television program Hardcore TV.[1]

At Hostile City Showdown, The Triple Threat (Shane Douglas, Chris Candido and Lance Storm) competed against Bam Bam Bigelow and Taz in a handicap match, which ended in a no contest when Bigelow turned on Taz while Candido turned on his World Tag Team Championship partner Storm and then Douglas reformed Triple Threat with Bigelow and Candido.[2] In the following weeks, Candido berated Storm in his promos for trying to be in pursuit of his lady Tammy Lynn Sytch, which was the reason of Candido dumping Storm as his tag team partner. A match was made between Candido and Storm at CyberSlam on the February 18 episode of Hardcore TV.[3]

On the January 7, 1998 episode of Hardcore TV, Brakkus defeated Paul Diamond and then Lance Wright threw down the WWF flag on Diamond. This brought out Taz, who confronted Team WWF and was warned by Judge Jeff Jones not to enter the ring but he attacked Jones and was about to fight Brakkus until Rob Van Dam and Sabu came in to attack Taz.[4] At House Party, Taz successfully defended the World Television Championship against 2 Cold Scorpio. After the match, Wright and Brakkus attacked Scorpio until Taz made the save and cleared the ring of Brakkus.[5] On the February 18 episode of Hardcore TV, it was announced that Taz would defend the title against Brakkus at CyberSlam.[3]

At Hostile City Showdown, Justin Credible attacked Mikey Whipwreck during a four-way dance and called Tommy Dreamer to come and fight and then Dreamer left the match to brawl with Credible while his partner The Sandman ended up losing the match. On the February 18 episode of Hardcore TV, it was announced that Dreamer would face Credible in a first blood match at CyberSlam.[3]

On the February 18 episode of Hardcore TV, it was announced that Rob Van Dam and Sabu would face the newly reformed Triple Threat members Bam Bam Bigelow and Shane Douglas in a tag team match at CyberSlam.[3]

The event began with a ten-bell salute, given in remembrance of Louie Spicolli who had died from an accidental drug overdose, just six days earlier, on February 15, 1998.[6]

CyberSlam received mostly negative reviews from critics. Arnold Furious of Wrestling Recaps stated "Nothing spectacular and the long matches (apart from the main event) sucked." However, he praised the first blood match, the main event match and Lance Storm versus Chris Candido matches as the best three matches of the event. He reviewed on the first blood match "If not for anything else but Beulah getting tombstoned." He commented on the Storm/Candido match "I would have liked to have seen this feud go a little longer. They always entertained and it was the best feud Candido ever had (IMO). Psychologically strong and Storm lifted Candido’s finisher." According to him, the main event was "not the standard of excellence that Rob Van Dam had during most of his ECW run but still the best match on the card."[6]

Scott Keith of 411Mania commented on the event "Nothing really worth seeing here for non-fans, and I’m sure fans already have it."[7]

At Living Dangerously, Chris Candido chose Shane Douglas as his tag team partner while Lance Storm revealed that Al Snow would be his mystery tag team partner. Snow pinned Douglas to earn himself a title shot at Douglas' ECW World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlepalooza.[8][9]