TNA Impact 31/7/2014; Shortest Review Ever
Leave a CommentI’m not watching Impact live anymore, though it turns out I could have.
I’m not watching Impact live anymore, though it turns out I could have.
Yes! Yes! Yes! BWF Radio has reached episode number 30! We rundown this week in wrestling (including NXT!), discuss Destination X, and pontificate on Kenny King’s wrestling career from this point on. Also – What does Ken Doane have to say about Tara? What do Kenny King and ROH say about each other? Who knew Armando Estrada was under contract to the WWE? Who’s left TNA? Did a 95 pound girl top this week’s Power Poll (hint: YES!)? Tune in this week and find out!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I92E-Cpwgh0&feature=player_detailpage[/youtube]After the recap, we jump right into Bully Ray shilling his new twitter account, @Realbully5150. He calls out Joseph Park and accepts his challenge for next week’s impact. All this will be a Anything Goes match except that Ray has a restraining order against Abyss who if he even shows up will be sent to rot in prison. Park is dumbfounded until he’s cheap shoted.
A Double and “H Double” discuss Aries giving up the belt at the end of the night. Which leads us right into a Destination X promo, which is embedded above.
Jason Hervey (Wonder Years for those in the know) attempts to interview Dixie Carter who is more than happy to talk about the New X-Division talent but not eager to talk about Claire Lynch. Talking of that new prospective X-Division talent err.. oh wait
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Open Call Out
Hulk Hogan puts over the Open Fight Night/Open Call Out and the Bound for Glory series tournament before moving on to A Double for his answer. (which has something to do with Plan C-check twitter for his response) Option A would have him hand over the title and challenge Roode at Destination X but if he lost he would have nothing. Option B he would decline and walk away still X Division champion and not be in the main event. And it appears Option C is where starting this year the current X Division champion will be allowed to turn in the belt for the chance at the World Title holder. Hogan is pleased. (So does that mean that if the X division champion loses he keeps the belt and if he wins we have an X division tournament for the title after the PPV? Um-okay.
Roode of course comes out and throws a tantrum saying that the X Division title is a paper championship and that he is the real world champion Austin Aries calls him out and the two battle it out. Security/Referees come out to break it up. Anderson comes down out and announces that basically when they’re done with each other Anderson will be waiting.
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We open the show on a Ultimate X match Aries vs Sabin vs Ion, sitting at home watching Chris Sabin back in his element was a welcome reprieve that was until Sabin tore is other ACL putting him back on the shelf. Aries retains with Hogan coming out to praise Aries before telling him that he would have to vacate the title to have a match against Bobby Roode at Destination X.
Bye Bye X division.
The push of Hernandez continues with a match against the television champion Devon. Its short and Hernandez really only botched one spot before being put down by Devon. Keep the belts away from Hernandez, Robbie E etc.
The bound for glory series featured the return our yours and my Pope D’angelo Dinero makes his return.
Pope be pimpin’ yes indeed.
And then James Storm came in and cleaned house and won. First Crimson and now 20 points in the BFG series. Go Cowboy!
New Knockout Champion Gail Kim Ms Tessmacher took on Madison “In love with who?” Rayne. I hear crickets but I digress. She (being Tessmacher) wins. This is where we need some more knockouts to make the surroundings look better, I’ve seen Madison Rayne too much.
[This post used to contain a picture of a topless Madison Rayne, her breasts covered only by her hands. Google made us take it down to comply with AdSense policy. Do they have ANY idea what kind of content their ads are on with the BoredWrestlingFan Radio podcast?]
Sunday Night saw the victoy of the “Asshole’ Ken Anderson over Hardy and RVD. I waited to see where this story would go since Hardy and RVD had storylines with Roode where as Anderson had a one off match from a couple of months ago.
This was a good match where Roode went over Anderson using the crossface and could possibly set up a any number of scenarios for Anderson afterwards. Or with Anderson tapping out will just close a door on that stretch for Roode who has been dealing with Hardy, RVD and Anderson for some time now and leave him clear for Austin Aries to feud with him over the remaining summer until Storm gets to him.
Questions I have are what will become of the X-division once Aries leaves? No Sabin, Sorenson or Nese. But we have Xema Ion and Mark Haskins? Need some new blood.
Until next week, PNTNR out!!!!
Whoop dee do. It’s time for Impact Wrestling… remember how the weeks leading up to Destination X were really good shows, and promising that TNA was turning things around? Me neither. Let’s hop to this, I suppose.
Hot off the heels of Sunday’s Destination X PPV, Impact Wrestling is set to follow up with something dubbed “A Midsummer’s Nightmare,” or so we’ve been told by Heath Farley last week. For those of you that have already read spoilers… well… let’s just get to this.
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The six sided ring has returned, along with Tenay and Borash on the announce team. Instead of doing a match by match review I would like to point out what worked (for me) what was okay and what didn’t.
First what did work.
The match of the night. Bar none. The contract signing 4 way. Watching these men rip each other apart for a chance at a iMPACT wrestling contract was amazing, it went so fast and so furiously with all the near falls and counters that I felt that my brain melted from all the excitement. And you know its good when the crowd is hyped. The feeling was a warm one to say the least. Even the interviews leading up to the match throughout the show got me hyped. Seeing snippets of their personalities against the interviewer So Cal Val was just icing on the cake. When it was all over and the winner was announced I know along with the audience that Impact should of signed all four competitors.
Winner Austin Aries.
The Ultimate X: Number #1 contenders match.
With the Motor city Machine Guns and Ink Inc on the shelves for the time being, we have both Shannon Moore and Alex Shelley going solo for a chance at the X division championship. The other two contenders Amazing Red and (sigh) Robbie E also came in to make an almost well rounded match. Innovative on the part of Shannon Moore toward the end on finding a way to reach the X. Amazing Red pulled a sick spot where he was tossed out the ring, corkscrewing onto Moore and Shelley on the outside. Even though I will mention him in the bad category, Robbie E pulled some decent maneuvers to keep the others away from the prize. Nothing fancy but it was better than his match against Kaz and Gen Me. But in the end Alex Shelley fulfilled his dream and won. This of course lead to Chris Sabin walking out to congratulate him to applause from the crowd.
winner Alex Shelley
*The return of Shark Boy
*Brian Kendrick winning the X championship
*Cameos by Curry Man and Suicide
Now time for the okay.
AJ Styles vs Daniels/ Jerry Lynn vs RVD
I know some fans may argue but sorry these matches reminded me of Jarrett vs Angle at Slammiversary, their earlier matches were ten times better and it just seemed to planned out ring wise. Everything seemed to paint by numbers I’m trying to say. Especially when you look at RVD vs Lynn, its as if they watched videos of their earlier ECW bouts and paste and copied it into their match. All that was missing was Bill Alphonso and a Philadelphia arena. As for the Daniels/Styles match it just seemed to plodding and not innovative enough to best their earlier encounters, specifically the Iron man match. For Nostalgia purposes and to help the buy rate of the PPV this just seemed forced and lackluster.
winner Styles/RVD
Kazarian vs Samoa Joe
This match seemed good on paper with the hopes of seeing past moves/finishers I was cheated out of the Reverse Flux Compassitor?! Joe put on some good spots with the suicide dive but everything was on his end was expected. Kaz who should of brought it for me to be convinced just seemed to do average work which resulted in a lame roll up pin after reversing the Samoan chokeout. Even the fans were chanting B.S. It was short and felt rushed.
winner Kaz
Now comes the bad. And boy was it bad.
Douglas Williams vs Matt Haskins (who?)
This was so out of place it was sickening watching Williams trying to hype up Haskins as a fellow Brit to which the crowd chanted (Who are You) was hysterically bad. The kid was nervous albeit he had some good spots but it didn’t excuse his slip up on the turnbuckle delaying the finish. This was essentially a dark match inserted into the PPV. No one cared to see it and the finish which came after the Kaz vs Joe match was an insult. Another roll up pin following a botched finisher?
winner Douglas Williams
Generation Me vs Shark boy/Eric Young
Shark Boy’s return aside everyone could tell that due to the sidelining of MCMG this was just thrown together to give Gen Me an opponent. Failed opportunities all around. EY was still EY even though he did put his talented all in the ring. Gen Me shown brightly even though every time I watched the match (excitement of Shark Boy withstanding) I really wanted to see a rematch with the Guns. In the end EY and Shark Boy win with a double chummer/wheelbarrow.
winner EY and Shark boy
Oh wait I forgot, why is Eric Young looking like a rip off of Ring of Honor gimmick wrestler Grizzly Redwood? Championship beard my ass. I just thought about it why not just have the television title defended where Eric Young took on Douglas Williams saving us sans Shark Boy of two unnecessary matches?
The over booking of the Kendrick vs Abyss Championship match.
I knew something was up when this match preempted the Styles/Daniels. Again like Slammiversary when the championship match is before a non title match you know overbooking is looming. That aside the match was the definition of ignominious, Kendrick bounced around off Abyss like a bird hitting a sliding glass door. And when the match finally went from degrading to interesting what happens, a ref bump! And who should come out but Eric Bischoff. The man who the spotlight can never dodge, even Hogan missed it. One dress down later, Kendrick blasts Bischoff only to be attacked by Immortal, who are then attacked by the X division roster, Immortal after clearing the ring go to finish Kendrick only to be met with more X division wrestlers making them clear the ring. Then I’m treated to a repeat of the notoriously horrid Knockouts tag match finish from Victory Road where Rosita some how sat on Winter and held her down for 3 count. We see again this time with Kendrick playing the part of Rosita with Abyss as Winter just lying there while a little man pins him. This chimerical display of booking took me completely out of the match. Follow that with carnations? roses? falling from the rafters was the movie equivalent of a sappy teen romance ending.
winner Brian Kendrick
*Robbie E needs to stop selling like he’s having an epileptic seizure. It was distracting and you could even tell Amazing Red was bothered by it when he looked at him with a “are you serious” look after dropping him with a kick.
There is no scintilla of a doubt that the X division will continue, with the additions of Haskins,Aries and Shelley now the number one contender we should see where this botched opportunity leads iMPACT Wrestling. Hopefully this is the sign that Dixie and Co have plans to furnish the Division with well rounded competitors who will wow us with their personalities and dare I say mic skills non gimmicky talk withstanding-looking at you, Kendrick-But we will have to wait. Until then I have to say Destination X was a “C” effort at best and C- at worst. Just average. Considering all the misused talent we could of seen better.
*And the commentary was average, we needed Don West. West and Tenay would have elevated this to a B. Just saying.
So we finally know the final four going into Destination X, Austin Aries vs Zima Ion vs Lowki vs Jack Evans. Liking the pedigree of this match and what could be had. Also we have the following matches to look forward to..
Douglas Williams open challenge
Ultimate X number one contenders match Shelley vs Moore vs Robbie E vs Red
Jerry Lynn vs RVD
Samoa Joe vs Kazarian
Styles vs Daniels and
Abyss (c) vs Kendrick
From looking at this the pay per view looks good not great but good. The 35 dollar price tag considering that there isn’t any build up and it seems that this event was thrown together from the last month with really no build up (outside of the nostalgia matches and the contract four way) and that includes the Abyss championship reign against Kendrick considering he’s dominated Brian time and time again. But we have what we have. For all purposes this seems more like a specialty PPV booking on nostalgia and just moving the belt onto (maybe) another person and to feud with whoever wins the Ultimate X match (here’s hoping for Shelley, who is long over due).
I want to believe that the recent interview with Brian Kendrick is a work and him not shooting on the situation over in Dixieland. Where the buy rates of this PPV will determine whether or not the division is retired and the belt is merged ROH style with the World title, we really need this to work as fans of the product. We really don’t want to see a company who takes everything that made it different and unique, from the ring to the more beefed up divisions (Knockouts,X and Tag teams) and watch it become a mirror of Vince’s wrestling philosophy.
What philosophy? you may ask?
McMahon teaches that cruiser-weights are too dangerous and costly to have. So simply merge them in with the heavyweights in the hopes that like Rey Mysterio, Eddie Guerrero, Chris Jericho and Benoit they persevere and eventually win the title.
Women do not make good wrestlers. Their job during the Attitude Era where to entice, and shock with their sexuality not there wrestling moves. And in a friendlier environment they are there to give fans a chance for a bathroom break.
And finally the TAG TEAM Division is dead. Essentially the only purpose of a tag team is to find the marketable wrestler of the two and jettison the other when the time is right. Making the belts set pieces to be worn at random.
That also brings to mind the Ultimate X match for the number one contender ship, we have a deserving man Shelley taking on Shannon Moore, Amazing Red and the so out of place Robbie E. Why is Robbie E and not Max or Jeremy Buck part of the match? to me if TNA wants to use Robbie put him against Eric Young. Those two fighting over the television belt only makes sense, they have talent but are mired in comedy jobber ville. Let me take you folks back to a time when WCW had their Television title champion the Disco Inferno defending his belt against Alex Wright, the German dancer, both men were humor material at best when first brought in but bonded with fans and put on some good matches even when the booking required dance offs and forced tag matches, we still saw them go one on one with each other over the belt and the fans were behind it. Put Robbie against Young, so we could finally have the belt defended without watching Young bounce from one humorless situation after another (besides the Wayne Arnold confrontation). Give us the Bucks, or even OKada, Kiyoshi someone who can actually wrestle that style to build to a feud worth watching.
If the X division falls we know the knockouts and tag team is not far behind. It usually works like dominoes one falling after the other. So here is to Sunday (day before my birth) and the return of the X division in all its splendor and its hopeful place in iMPACT for years to come. Where it deserves to be.
Back on Thursdays, is this G here. Yep, another week of craziness bookended by a long weekend up North and down South… which included all the drama of the NHL free agent frenzy. But you don’t care about holidays or hockey, no valued reader. You want to know what happened over in Orlando… and who Sting will emulate, tonight? Hell, I’ll even toss the Power Poll at the end for you!
It is the go-home show before this Sunday’s Destination X PPV.