ECW Legend Shane Douglas Says He Has 'Huge Respect' For Lance Storm

During an appearance on his "Franchise University" podcast, former ECW World Heavyweight Champion Shane Douglas was asked about Lance Storm and Rob Van Dam's match at ECW's Barely Legal pay-per-view in 1997.

"Huge respect for Lance [Storm]," Douglas said. "And I'll tell you why. Lance, as you know when you watch him, he is pretty vanilla in character. There's not a whole lot going on there in character ... I've always said I am so thankful I was in [on] the ground floor of ECW because that would have been a really tough crowd to win over once they had gotten chugging. And Lance came in there, albeit without that over-the-top 'Franchise' personality or the Candido delivery or whatever, and he won them over, hold to hold to hold. Not an easy thing to do."

Douglas added that Van Dam, who was a replacement for the late Chris Candido at Barely Legal due to injury, was "renowned in the ECW Arena" by the time he stepped into the ring at the promotion's inaugural pay-per-view event, while Storm was relatively new and hadn't yet had a significant bout in the company. 

The clash itself saw Van Dam defeat Storm. After kicking a steel chair into Storm's face with a Van Daminator, Van Dam picked up a pinfall victory following a standing moonsault. Storm retired from the ring in 2016 and now works behind the scenes at Impact Wrestling. 

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "Franchise University" with a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.