The 2005 ECW One Night Stand was the inaugural One Night Stand professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). It took place on June 12, 2005, at the Hammerstein Ballroom in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York. Although wrestlers from WWE's Raw and SmackDown! brands appeared on the show, the event was primarily produced as a reunion show for wrestlers from the former Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) promotion, which had folded in 2001. After the promotion's closure, WWE acquired ECW's assets in 2003.
The main event was a tag team match between Dudley Boyz (Bubba Ray and D-Von) and the team of Tommy Dreamer and The Sandman. Two of the matches on the undercard were Chris Benoit versus Eddie Guerrero, and Mike Awesome versus Masato Tanaka.
Production
Background
In 2001, the Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) promotion was closed down due to financial issues, and World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) acquired the former promotion's assets in 2003. With the overwhelming success of The Rise and Fall of ECW (2004) documentary, WWE announced that they would be holding an ECW reunion show on June 12, 2005, at the Hammerstein Ballroom in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York titled ECW One Night Stand. Although the build-up for the pay-per-view began in the middle of May, plans were in the works behind the scenes for several months in advance. Tommy Dreamer was in charge of organizing the hardcore-based event and getting ECW alumni to participate, who were referred to as "ECW Originals" in the build to the show. He contacted several people, including The Sandman, Sabu, Justin Credible, and ECW commentator Joey Styles. Reports later stated that Paul Heyman was working with Dreamer to help prepare the event. Other ECW related wrestlers were later added to the pay-per-view. The event was publicly confirmed by WWE through a Dish Network magazine in March 2005. In an interview with SLAM! Sports days before One Night Stand, ECW original Rob Van Dam announced he had asked Vince McMahon about the idea of holding an ECW reunion event. This event was sponsored by Destroy All Humans! video game.
Storylines
Although many of the individual matches on the One Night Stand card were announced weeks before the pay-per-view occurred, none of them got any build-up on any of WWE's weekly programs, with WWE instead choosing to focus on an "invasion" angle, with several Raw and SmackDown! superstars feuding against wrestlers from the original ECW.
The invasion angle began on the May 9 episode of Raw, when Raw General Manager Eric Bischoff made a statement regarding the pay-per-view, saying that he'd "squash ECW like a bug." The next week on Raw, Tajiri agreed to an ECW Rules match with Chris Benoit. In the middle of the match, however, Bischoff came out to stop it, and announced anything related to ECW was banned from Raw. He also vowed to "destroy" ECW with the help of the Raw superstars chosen to compete at the pay-per-view. Bischoff planned an ECW funeral for the next week's Raw, but WWE Chairman Vince McMahon interrupted and spoke of his support for the ECW reunion and his financial interest in bringing back the promotion. Paul Heyman then came out and reminded McMahon that, while Heyman did not own ECW, he still had control of it. Heyman also said that he welcomed Bischoff's invasion, claiming, "You may light a fire that you can’t put out." and proceeded to light the funeral wreath ablaze. In a rematch from the last week's Raw, Benoit defeated Tajiri in an ECW Rules match after locking in the Crippler Crossface. The next week, Bischoff set up a Tables match between Edge and Benoit. During the match, Benoit attempted a diving headbutt with Edge on a table, but failed after Lita moved Edge off it. At that point, Bischoff sent several Raw superstars to the ring to assault Benoit, with Gene Snitsky booting Benoit in the face, and Edge powerbombing Benoit through the table for the victory.
The feud between the Raw superstars and ECW Originals also spread over to SmackDown!. On the May 26 episode of SmackDown!, Kurt Angle stated that ECW was a low-class promotion, and that he would be part of the WWE invasion of One Night Stand, taking SmackDown! volunteers with him. A week later, Angle asked Tazz to join him in the invasion and on the same episode of SmackDown!, John "Bradshaw" Layfield (JBL) announced he would be joining Angle in invading the pay-per-view. When Tazz rejected the offer, Angle reacted by assaulting Tazz and leaving him bleeding in the ring.