Total Extreme Championship Wrestling, as their defunct official website clearly stated, was formed on August 4th 2001. Under the guidance of TWF Veteran Marz, the aim of TECW was destroy the TWF. And they were very unsuccessful, wouldn't you agree?
TECW's roster began building, and by September of that year, they were quite a serious contender to the TWF's crown with some real stars on their wage bills. More surprising however, was that it's very first member was a young lad known as Underfire. Underfire has become far more successful however, for being called The Shott.
However, that plan that Marz was so good at assembling fell apart, when ironically he became the TWF's Chairman in 2001 as Mr. BIG decided to tour the US, and with Mr. Edwards stepping away from the promotion to explore other business interests. Not only that, Marz picked up TWF Managing Director Doug Edwards's stake in the promotion, giving him total control over proceedings. But, he led the TWF through it's darkest times, as he cut wrestling to a minimum and instead had ludicrous story lines that more or less resembled an episode of Jerry Springer. Fans were leaving, and Marz took the TWF back to an even worse position financially than it was a year earlier and Doug Edwards bought the TWF. However, in March 2002, Mr. BIG made his famous return on an episode of TWF RAW is WAR. When Biggie returned to the TWF, Marz's first action was to make him the CEO of the company, and Biggie brought his new found experience and Economics degree to the front of the company's thinking.
This led to what many call the TWF's golden age. Biggie and Marz led the TWF to very top, and fans who left the promotion for dead were coming back in droves. But, Marz's erratic backstage behaviour was driving many, including Biggie insane. In June 2002, Marz was thrown out of the TWF Chairmanship by Mr. BIG, the only person who had the power to do so, and before Marz could do anything else, Biggie reinstated the TWF Board of Directors, who unanimously decided to revoke Marz's chairmanship and reinstated Mr. Edwards, who had returned from his business opportunities, as well as announcing Doug Edwards as MD once more.
However, Marz was remarkably pleased at the way things had turned out, as it gave TECW more exposure than he could have ever dreamed of. And on July 3rd 2002, Marz hacked the TWF Discussion Forums using the help of High Voltage and The Shott when Mr. BIG was absent from the office. An irate Biggie did not find out until that August who had perpetrated the deed. Marz was secretly smiling at his devious plan, as his knowledge of the TWF's workings and business plan gave TECW a competitive edge. Marz then instructed his long-time lackey The Shott to design a TECW Network (which was a rip-off of the award-winning TWF Web) and the TECW Discussion Boards (which Marz claimed were much better than the TWF Forums, which were rebuilt within days of Marz's hacking of the site). The TWF actually sued TECW for similarity twice. But, TECW were then given a taste of their own medicine as TECW's boards were hacked twice, once by High Voltage, and the second time by the TWF themselves who infamously left a message on the front page saying "Guess Who? Revenge for the last time bitch".
Through out the summer of 2002, Marz and The Shott decided to advance their master plan, but buying a rather small stake in the upcoming RWF, owned by High Voltage. This stake surrounded the RWF's talent; giving TECW first choice on any contracts of the superstars should they wish to leave. Unbeknownst to the two, the TWF was actually working together with High Voltage on the venture. After holding a series of successful shows on the Extreme Sports network, the RWF folded in August 2002, with High Voltage citing a lack of interest. But, the name was revived twice, once by Shott and HV in 2004, but more successfully in 2005 by Mr. BIG who changed the RWF's business model and talent and did something the previous ownership never did: get the RWF to make a profit on their shows.
In September 2002, Marz led a massive offensive, by trying to buy contracts of several highly regarded superstars; such as Bret Hart, Bill Goldberg and Macho Man Randy Savage. However, their main signing was Stone Cold Steve Austin, who had left the WWE just months previously. Marz infamously claimed "my signings will lead the end to the TWF vs. TECW war and a convincing victory for TECW". Marz then went on to infamously claim that the TWF mimicked the WWE's every move, claiming that bringing the RWF onto TWF TV was a shot at a Brand Extension, when Marz didn't realise the TWF was going through with an angle he planned of an RWF invasion of the company. Mr. BIG and Marz traded shots back and fourth on TWF Television for many weeks, but TECW were visibly winning the war in terms of talent. Promised by big money bonuses, Marz hired much of the TWF's wrestlers, forcing Biggie to promote many wrestlers from the TWF's development company, BCW and overseas stars for ratings spikes. In fact, many of the TWF's top stars debuted during this time as replacements for departed talent.
However, these ratings spikes for the TWF were actually sustained as people began to turn off TECW shortly after it held it's first ever Pay-Per-View event, the King of Hardcore. After which, Marz interrupted a scheduled episode of TECW "Classics" (which at the time only featured their own show on a 3 month delay), to inform the audience that TECW had killed the TWF and become the #1 promotion in Wales. But, Marz over-looked the TWF's new breed. As stars such as Biggie, Frekishi, NJS and AJ Jeffers, those who never defected to TECW, new talent rose up through the ranks such as Blade. As stars began returning to the TWF, Biggie finally got his revenge on the company. He was booked to face TECW World Champion, The Shott on an episode of Grit BasH and in a huge upset with TECW superstars surrounding the ring and Marz as timekeeper, Biggie pinned The Shott and quickly left the ring with TECW's World Championship belt. On the following episode of RAW, Biggie revealed his latest protégé had been wrestling in TECW for many months: The Assassin. He presented the title to The Assassin, who led the cameras out to the trash cans outside the arena on October 7th 2002 and dumped the World Championship in the trash. On October 28th, Total Extreme Championship Wrestling announced that they would be renaming with immediate effect to… ncW. Nuclear Championship Wrestling. NCW then faded out the use of the TECW name, redesigning their message boards and pulling their website, announcing they did not need it anymore. NCW did not hold many shows in the rest of 2002, with rumours of talent problems dominating online news wires.
NCW's 2003 didn't get off to the best of starts as it was revealed on January 8th that an unknown Chinese man had hacked into their forums and had been using it for his own purposes. Marz then moved the forums from SuddenLaunch to ProBoards in March of 2003. He then deleted the boards during June 2003 so no-one could hack his forums whilst he was on vacation. However, to Marz's shock, when he returned a few weeks later, NCW's TV barely scraped anything the TWF got, and Ben Shottle announced he was attempting to re-start the RWF. As soon as this happened, disgruntled employees began to follow suit, the biggest name of which was RWF original, The Assassin. Shottle would however fore fill his contract before leaving the company.
This killed NCW off for good. On June 25th 2003, the news many fans had waited years to hear was finally delivered. After a promise by Sky Sports News all day that the world of wrestling would be shaken up, at 3:04pm, Shottle took the podium at a press conference at NCW Arena to announce that NCW was being wound up after administrators were called in months earlier. TWF fans were delighted. A war for a while which it looked like they would never win, they won with convincing style. Later that night, the TWF's three chief power figures, Mr. BIG, Mr. Edwards and Doug Edwards "buried" NCW on the first episode of Grit BasH since the announcement, and Mr. Edwards infamously finished the segment by saying that NCW will R.I.P. – Rot Into Pieces.
NCW will leave a legacy, but perhaps not the one intended. Marz set up the promotion in good faith, as competition for the TWF, but as the war escalated, the money Marz had floating around got bigger, along with his ego, and whilst the TWF was struggling whilst he was succeeding, the new TWF talent and making use of what they had without their stars who went to NCW gave the TWF locker room a new sense of comradely, although, some animosity still exists to this day towards those who left for NCW.