SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
HITS
Grado’s Quest For Love: Sometimes Impact’s campy comedy hits the spot and this was one of those occasions. Grado is trying to get married so he can stay in the United States, so he tried to ask out every Knockout on the roster. A dumb premise, for sure, but one of those “only in wrestling” moments you either love or hate. The reactions from Rosemary and Laurel Van Ness were pretty great and the bit didn’t overstay its welcome. However, that was a weird an underwhelming way to reintroduce Rosemary to TV for the first time after she lost her title.
ACH vs. Everett: While it was only six minutes long, ACH and Andrew Everett delivered an entertaining Super X Cup match. Even though Everett is the Impact regular, they went with the right call of having ACH go over. He feels much fresher and has incredible athleticism. It’s also worth noting that Everett was being a bit heelish in the match. His cockiness and facial expressions seemed to indicate he’s turning again soon. Here’s a thought. Maybe they should focus on getting him some new trunks and a haircut first?
Trevor Lee Wins: Trevor Lee won a match? Well, how about that? Sure, it was against William Weeks (who is a pretty entertaining jobber) but they’re finally doing SOMETHING with him again. I’ll take it. While Lee wasn’t The Rock on the mic, he proved in his short promo that he didn’t need Shane Helms doing all his work for him.
Gail’s Promo: The most vital Knockout in TNA/Impact history announced she was leaving the promotion at the end of the year. Dang. Gail seemed genuine in her promo, and it was one of those incredibly rare, actual “feel good” moments in wrestling. I kept expecting Sienna to come out to ruin the moment and cut a promo on her. There’s plenty of time for that later. While the segment was nice, it would have been even nicer had they not immediately transitioned into that Swole segment.
MISSES
Alberto Overshadows: The whole situation between Alberto El Patron and Paige has overshadowed Impact. It was strange and a bit unpleasant to watch the crowd cheer him like a hero knowing that he had been suspended in real life after the tapings. Impact knew what they were getting into when they signed him and it finally came back to bite them. However, it would have been too difficult to take him out of the show as he was in at least 30 minutes of it. Real life drama simply made it impossible to get involved in any storyline involving their World Champion. It’s going to be an interesting and strange few weeks of TV.
LAX’s Night: It’s great to see LAX get some attention from the creative team but they’re making it needlessly hard for them to get over as main event threats. Early on in the show, Bobby Lashley took out everyone in the group by himself so he could save Alberto El Patron. In the main event, the announcers put over how great of a unit LAX was…only to see them lose clean to two guys who had never wrestled together before. Even though the match was entertaining, there’s no way the tag team champs should be positioned like that.
Let It Go: Besides all the other problems with El Patron, the guy is just coming across as overly bitter. Yes, his last run in WWE was terrible, but complaining about it on-air makes him look like a big complainer. Besides, it doesn’t make sense within the context of storylines. In WWE, he lost all the time, which is why he didn’t receive title shots. So is GFW saying their competitor is fake and their stuff is real? What does being “held back” mean in their narrative? It’s just bad territory to get into because you can never make sense of it.
Swole: No idea who these muscle heads are and don’t care to know. They need to leave. Right…NOW! Two guys from the Swole Mate show went face-to-face with Chris Adonis and Eli Drake and made the two wrestlers look like children. Considering Adonis and Drake are trained fighters, why would they even be concerned about those two goons? It’s another case of regular characters looking worse because a “celebrity” (this is vastly, vastly stretching that term here) showed up at TV for the night.
The Minis: Octagoncito and Demus delivered a decent match, but I was left with an overwhelming feeling of “why am I watching this?” Every division in the company is in need of some attention and they decide to introduce an entirely new one? This just seems like something they’ll give up on or forget about in a couple of months.
The Grand Championship: It’s probably best to get rid of this title. Marufuji and Moose put on a decent match, but Grand Championship matches have never felt different enough from a regular match to justify its existence. Since there is a clock, the wrestlers should be going full-blast trying to win within time. Instead, there’s methodical pacing and chops and strikes that take too long to execute. Perhaps a different secondary title in the vein of the US or Intercontinental would give mid-carders something to do on TV, but the Grand Championship matches just aren’t cutting it.
Laurel’s Dress: First of all, I just want to say I don’t want to tell anyone how to dress (except maybe Andrew Everett)! People are free to live their own lives. However, MERELY as an observation, Laurel Van Ness has been wearing the same dress for months and it’s getting more torn up and shorter by the week. Basically…we’ve reached the point where it looks like she’s wrestling in her undies! She’s wearing shorts over them I assume, but that’s the visual it gives off and her matches are now filled with a series of upskirt shots. It doesn’t quite seem to fit in well with women’s wrestling in 2017 when you compare her attire to the stars of WWE, NXT, and ROH. So maybe it’s just me, but it might be time for her to put on some sort of wrestling gear again?!
NOW CHECK OUT LAST WEEK’S COLUMN: IMPACT HITS & MISSES 7/6: Lashley-Alberto rematch, Trevor Lee, Bruce Prichard, Super X Cup, Promotion Name Change
Wow. Off the mark again on several items including the minis. Would you rather watch the same tired match 100 times or something different? Most of us would rather have variety, but if you want to see the Miz Vs Ambrose over and over and over, you know where to find it.
On the mark, however, on El Patron. Agree 100 percent, get this guy off tv. I would rather see a “match from the vault” than this guy on tv.
How often does WWE’s comedy hit the mark? Never? Ok, maybe once a year. 🙂
Uh, the two SWOLE guys, are from a tv show on POP. If you watch the show, and sometimes I question that, there seems to be a commercial for them every 15 minutes. Agreed, tho, they aren’t brining much to the table as far as entertainment for me either. That segment stunk worse than when Hornswoggle was revealed as GM of Raw.
Overall, this was a good show. Along with New Japan and Ring of Honor, it was better than anything I saw on WWE tv this week.
Damn how these reviewers judge wrestling only in the moment is amazing. There’s no looking ahead or trying to guess and anticipate where things that’s happening might go. They judge every show and every match with no thought of where things might lead in the future. No wonder people complain so much. If you can’t see where that El Patron and LAX thing is going you shouldn’t be a wrestling fan !
the Swole thing is part of a network obligation to Pop. Shouldn’t people who work for a wrestling dirtsheet know about shows having network obligations?
Apparently he didn’t get the memo. Excellent point btw.
Corwin and Sloan. Agreed. The guys that review TNA don’t seem to like it. I understand not liking the show, but it does make a difference in the reviews. They should turn it over to someone more objective who might enjoy the show.