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(1) HERNANDEZ, HOMICIDE, JAY LETHAL and CURRY MAN win the Feast or Fired Match
This was a definite step up from last year's outing. They had more time focused on individual performances in the ring, which, as anyone who's ever seen The Royal Rumble knows, is the key to making something out of these massive matches. Not surprisingly, Hernandez was dominant and awesome early, and had a particularly nice interaction with Sonjay Dutt. Curry Man and Homicide's briefcase grabs were relatively uneventful, but Lethal won his briefcase right out of the hands of The Motor City Machine Guns. After the match, they revealed that Lethal had won a tag team title shot; giving him & Creed the belts would be a good way to incorporate the tag team division into the ongoing war. The MCMG spent some time complaining about the outcome, leading Borash to explode at them. I like it when the announcers have some personality, and Shelley continually interrupting JB was getting really annoying.

The Beautiful People did some ranting backstage about cellulite. Now that my father has pointed it out, I do have to say that Cute Kip is surprisingly funny in the background of Beautiful People promos.

So the MCMG ranting was funny, Lethal getting the tag title shot was interesting, and Cute Kip & The Beautiful People were amusing. However, I should probably note that, by my count, between those things and the various entrances, there were less than fifteen minutes of action in the first forty minutes of show. TNA really needs to work on pacing issues.

(2) ODB, ROXXI, & TAYLOR WILDE defeated SHARMELL & THE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE
This was definitely the "oh hell, we have a few more people to get on the card" match, and by those standards, it was actually fairly decent. By any more exacting standards, it doesn't exactly hold up very well. Pick which way you want to judge it.

EY cut an interview with JB, then bumped into and punked out the Motor City Machine Guns. All this Machine Guns stuff is fine, but it really left me with the impression that TNA couldn't quite figure out how to adjust from their usual eight or nine matches to tonight's seven.

(3) ERIC YOUNG defeated SHEIK ABDUL BASHIR
After being physically provoked by Bashir, Shane Sewell (which, thanks to "The X Factors", we finally know how to spell) kicked Bashir's hands off the ropes while he was attempting to block an attempted Sunset Flip. That led directly to Young's win. After the match, Bashir finally provoked Sewell into a physical response, then beat the hell out of him and busted his forehead wide open. Bashir tried to leave with the belt, but Cornette met him on the ramp and took it. The commentators later explained that he was holding up the belt till Impact. They also tried to make a big deal about how Sewell had "crossed the line", but I'm not sure how breaking someone's hold on the ropes counts. Earl Hebner did that in exactly every match he ever refereed involving Triple H. Also, I hate this holding up business, as it just takes away from the moment of a title change. If it's vacated then I guess it makes sense, but it's just plain silly if he ends up just giving it back to one of them.

(4) CHRISTY HEMME defeated AWESOME KONG by DQ
Christy kept fighting through everything Kong threw at her. Saeed tried to give Kong the illegal advantage, but Christy fought through that too. Finally Saeed got fed up and just DDTed Christy right in front of the ref, drawing the DQ. I would like to once again stress just how deeply runs my hatred for the covertly-done rule change preventing titles in TNA from changing hands by disqualification. "We used to promise you basically decisive finishes, but then we realized that scripting those takes a lot of work." If they absolutely had to give us a screw job ending, I would have even been happier with a draw. I've railed against the change on at least one occasion, so I'll drop it for now, but it really took a lot of the heat off what I felt was otherwise a pretty decent match.

JB talked to Kurt Angle backstage. I think I'm going to take on a new policy wherein I refuse to talk about any segment where anyone talks about Jarrett's kids; otherwise I'm just encouraging more such segments (and we all know that TNA lives or dies by my encouragement). Until otherwise noted, these segments will be marked as "CODE: SCREW TNA, THAT'S NOT COOL".

(5) BEER MONEY INCORPORATED defeated ABYSS & MATT MORGAN
The match had a bit of fun to it, as James Storm kept leaving Robert Roode hung out to dry in his (Storm's) attempts to avoid getting anywhere near Abyss. Other than that this was fairly standard tag team fare, but with three good performers and one putting in one of his more competent showings, that was fine with me. Beer Money won with a brass 'nuks shot.

Not-Crystal chatted with Mick Foley backstage, who assures her that he'll call Angle's match with Rhino right down the middle. The Motor City Machine Guns came by, and told Foley that they'd be able to coexist as long as he did the right thing and gave them Lethal's Feast or Fired title shot. After the Guns walked off, Foley promised to deal with Shelley on Impact.

The Guns came out and made camp in the middle of the ring. They called for Mick Foley, but only got Jim Cornette. That exact same thing happened to me at my 25th birthday party. After some witty repartee, he said he'd have security clear them out of the ring. Before he could make good on that threat, Suicide hit the ring and knocked them out himself. Okay, my one month estimate on the shelf-life of the Suicide gimmick might have drastically undervalued the contribution of Kaz's crazy athleticism.

Rhino cut a CODE: SCREW TNA, THAT'S NOT COOL.

(6) KURT ANGLE defeated RHINO
I normally don't agree with the people who say that TNA has way too many screw-job endings for anyone to care about the match before the outside interference. About half-way through this match, however, I got an email for work, and since Kurt Angle had more or less explicitly promised outside interference ahead of time, I figured there was no reason not to answer it. Anyway, this match was fairly old school. That's not so much my thing, but the personalities involved made it fairly decent. Angle won when Mick Foley got distracted by a debuting Al Snow, allowing Kurt to use a steel chair. Despite the fact that Mick counted the three, Angle still threatened him after the match.

(7) STING, KEVIN NASH, SCOTT STEINER & BOOKER T defeated AJ STYLES, SAMOA JOE, & TEAM 3D
This main event was actually a lot of fun. Quick tags by the MEM covered for the fact that only one of them can still really wrestle anymore (though two of the other three still occasionally have their moments). AJ & Joe carried most of the match, but Team 3D certainly kept pace. Sting beat Joe with a Scorpion Death Drop after Nash weakened him with a low blow, but then the Stinger seemed to feel guilty about it. First, I think that by TNA standards, winning in virtue of a low blow doesn't really count as dirty. Second, what does it say about the younger TNA wrestlers when they can't beat the MEM when assisted by Team 3D and doubts by one member of the opposing side? Next month, we'll see Kevin Nash single-handedly defeat Samoa Joe, AJ Styles, Consequences Creed, Team 3D, and the 82nd Airborne Division while Sting sits in a corner and cries.

Overall: This was a fun show, capped off by a watchable main events. There were lots of small annoyances, but all of the matches were decent and some were actively very good. My pre-show prediction of "solid" was, in retrospect, fairly apt. B+




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