RedJed

Wow that was beyond bad. Although Christy almost lost her panties there for a second. Boooyakasha!

Please shit on this match, Orlando. PLEASE. This is horrible.

Hmmm Backlund v. Starr next month?!! That was the weakest chicken face submissions I have ever seen, esp. as they left the ring. They didnt give Starr-Senshi enough time at all unfortunately. Steiner v. Tomko is one of the dumbest ideas of a program I've heard in awhile.

Damn near the entire front row wearing what appears to be baseball jerseys?! The fuck....?! This match is good so far.... Been good - busy as hell but not bad! Whenever I make a trip back out there we should take a smoke cruise to TJ for one of their lucha shows. I was back in CA in Dec and missed it last time, damn!

I really didnt like that opener that much as it was all over the place, we didnt need the random "gang" run-ins. Was that one guy Machete? Overall just a filler "match" to continue the program I guess. The strippers out there made no sense but I still didnt mind. They added Starr-Senshi to the ppv (why didnt they advertise this ahead of time for the lineup?) - this should be something. Nice surprise. Whats up brotha Young?

Steiner just did a hell of a bizzare interview on the countdown show ending with him saying "I'm hungry" - teasing a Tomko/Steiner match or something too. They got dancers in the cages ala back in TNA from years back (during the weekly shows in Nashville) as part of the Little Italy street fight. I know, it doesnt make any sense. Small cafe tables are also in the ring as they are doing the LAX-Duds match first on the ppv I guess.

Pan is actually not the faun but is the weird looking creature with the eyes coming out of his hands......

I'm hoping they do the Shitsky-Lashley program over the course of the next two months on TV, leading to something much bigger at Mania. What that is, I'm not sure, but they just can't go ahead with that match at Mania, same with Holly-Lashley too. On the subject of bringing more to the new breed-original feud, why not Foley? He has storyline beef with McMahon anyway, being fired last year on air. The show last night was alright, kept me watching, but annoyed me more than anything by the end of it.

Its Iowa! They get crazy over being the first state to get to vote in Presidential primaries. I have to assume this is the biggest event to ever emenate from Souix City. It's got to be one of the smallest markets to ever host a Raw. They had a Smackdown taping right before Judgement Day 05 in that same building, was there live and that arena is so damned small I swear I was in a bit amped up high school gym or something. A college campus venue on most universitys held more than this place easily. But the crowd was hot for what I thought was a bad show, all I remember was JBL/2 Hotty, Orlando Jordan v. Heidenreich shitfest and Cena against MNM or something weird like that. Was impressed with the show tonight though, didnt go live but I was surprised to see such a solid show booked overall.

Who even called TNA a "refreshing alternative" in the first place?

In a word: YES You were basically right on with the entire ending there. Damn great film.

I think it will take more than one week of WSX to say "TNA is trailing ECW and WSX in the ratings" - TNA has been averaging anything from a 1.2 to a .8 week to week IIRC. ECW is most certainly still getting a higher rating than TNA, but WSX is another story altogether. For what it's worth, I hope WSX does well as I was extremely impressed with the presentation last night. It was a clear alternative, much more of an alternative than TNA provides against ECW/WWE stuff.

I've seen enough Booker v. Cena matches before to never want to see another one again. Sorry. After tonites Raw and the Rumble, this is kind of at least what I am hoping they do. WWE Title Cena v. Taker v. HBK (built from a Taker/HBK match at NWO that gives Michaels credibility to be in this match) World Title Batista v. Orton OR Batista v. Orton v. Edge ECW Title Lashley v. RVD v. Monte Brown v. CM Punk Edge v. Hogan OR Umaga v. Hogan OR Khali v. Hogan Foley w/ Trump v. Shane w/ Vince Undercard TLC Money in the Bank J. Hardy v. Nitro v. Carlito v. Benoit v. Kennedy v. Rey (if healthy, otherwise MVP) Flair v. Finley Kane v. Booker London/Kendrick v. WGTT (Unify tag belts, just keep them on the brand that wins them) Mickie v. Melina, throw a couple other girls in there if you want from SD for the Woman's title Interpromotional battle royale

Pretty lame sounding - the show is, to me, really hard to sit through in the past month or so. Watching WSX instead when it comes on.

I dont know what the chances are, but I wouldnt mind Cena v. HBK v. Taker at Mania for the WWE title. That was the first thing that came to my mind tonight after the show ended. Not sure where that would leave Batista though, I dont think Kennedy is ready just yet for a main event slot at Mania and would probably throw Edge over there to challenge Batista, or even Orton v. Batista (since there is backstory there and they were originally going to have Batista v. Orton last year at Mania anyway). Orton v. Edge, although it seems likely given where they are going now with a tag team title loss, just doesn't really sound that interesting at all to me. Orton v. Batista and Hogan v. Edge or something would be much more suited since there is both decent past stories in tact to those matches.

It's already been declared to not happen at Mania via WON this week.

Some news on Mania stuff from the Observer.... Closest thing to a lock at this point is Taker/Batista, title v. streak, although still not definate (nothing for the card is set in stone at this point) Cena/Michaels was suggested, but won't be happening due to two possible face/face main events for the titles, although of course if HHH was still healthy, it would have been fine. Edge and Orton are two leading shots v. Cena, Orton of course preferred due to the fact they blewoff Edge/Cena pretty strongly, but a possibility of a Cena/Edge/Orton match is still being talked about. Options w/ Hogan are: Hogan v. Khali Hogan v. Umaga In either of those matches, its unclear if this would be with the Trump/Vince in corners or not (wasnt clarified in the issue) Possibility they are pushing hardest is the definate Trump/Vince angle tied into a Hogan v. Shane McMahon match w/ Khali also being "bodyguard" to the McMahon side, so Hogan can still get the big slam in on Khali w/out having to have an actual match with him. Show still hasnt committed to Mania, but just because Khali was the idea to replace him intially v. Hogan. ---- My personal feelings at least on the Trump/Vince angle is that they should NOT put Hogan in this slot at all because it gives the opportunity to give the rub to others, first and foremost. Second, there is nothing interesting in a Hogan/Shane match at all with all of this tie-ins either. Ideally, Carlito and another heel that could get a nice rub (this could even be a guy from SD like Kennedy or something or I hate to say this, but Khali himself even is acceptable) should be tied into the Trump/Vince angle. Or if they wanted to still go back to a previous idea, why not just do Foley v. Vince w/ Trump and the McMahon family in the corners? Hogan v. Khali, Show, or Umaga is just fine as a solo match from a business standpoint for Hogan. My suggestion would be to throw Edge v. Hogan out there personally though and go with the pushed Cena v. Orton match as well (just because that match hasnt been done hardly ever and its the only option of something being fresh). Edge, ideally, should have a strong slot in the card and throwing him into an Orton/Cena singles title match would just be adding him somewhere for filler. Batista/Taker is a lock just due to nothing else to go with for the SD side that is fresh unless you're going to hotshot a returning guy like Lesnar, Goldberg, etc against Batista.

Its been said before, but I think the key is that they should at least take the ppvs out of the Impact Zone, even if a few are still in FL even that is ok as long as its not in that arena. They have no way to make any $$$ from the gate doing ppvs there since its free admission. Having Impact stay in the same arena isnt THAT much of a big deal to me, but a different atmosphere and location with the ppvs is key IMO.

Look for the usual overbooking to go into overdrive for that Impact. Wouldnt be at all surprised to see Spike give TNA a second hour - although if they do, they would be smart to have the second hour NOT head to head.

Doubtful. To his credit, Russo was the one who really pushed Vince out of the "good guys and bad guys" concept. That cannot be denied. With that said, I think the "shades of grey" concept can work (Heyman fooled around with it alot in ECW back in the day too) but the characters and angles to those characters have to make sense. For instance, Sting and Angle having some sort of comrodery (sp?) makes no freaking sense whatsoever. Angle feuding with Christian also is goofy and nonsensical to say the least as well.

This was probably one of the most jam packed hours of Impact in recent memory. WAY WAY WAY too much happening for ANYTHING to mean anything.

Small idea to Mania card.......if they are adament about Hogan on the card, what about using him and Flair as a team of some sort against ???? Otherwise, I could certainly see Hogan v. Edge for some odd reason possibly booked. Or Hogan/Flair v. Rated RKO maybe?

Don West gets his ass kicked by Angle? Almost goes crazy on So Cal Val? Consider me interested. These spoilers sound alright but I just know its all going to be extremely rushed on TV. Russo is now clearly having the "shades of grey" in full effect on top with alot of guys with Sting almost sounding like he's heeling a bit at times. They are giving layers to Abyss, which is at least intruiging compared to the same old character with him. Angle and Joe are both tweening back and forth as heels and faces week to week as well, case in point week one here it sounds like Angle is in heel mode, and the next week he is teaming with Rhyno? Hmmmm. Getting a strong vibe they are doing Angle/Joe III at Final Resolution though and thats a huge mistake. Would have liked Harris going heel instead of Storm on this eventual AMW breakup though, figured there was going to be a typical Russo swerve there, guess not.

Overall a pretty strong show, steps ahead from the dissapointing ppv last month. Only one really lame part of the show as a whole. The cable ppv channel was acting all goofy and I pretty much missed the opening match altogether, sounds like it was alright at least? I didn't get who's bright idea that was for the Young/Traci bikini contest. If this is Russo's idea of humor, it's pathetic. Quite possibly one of the most ridiculously bad segments in TNA history, at least since they started monthly ppvs. The forced laughs of Tenay and West made it even the more lame. Only real strong negative to the show was this. Could have and should have been done on the pre-show or just on Impact if they had to. If the Orlando fans wouldnt be so about EY, this would have flopped bad to another audience in any other location likely. Just god awful unfunny WWE-like "humor" which is ironic since the company publicly rips on the WWE writing so badly in the VKM skits when they are doing the same shit essentially at times like this. The other skits on the show werent nearly as annoying/bad. One thing though - that new chick interviewer was REALLY off on her segments knocking WWE. I've seen better verbal skills in porns. The VKM stuff was alright, saved alot in part to the quazi-shoot by Road Dogg, as the shit before that was just uncreative bashing of WWE in my eyes. The baseball players angle was alright, kind of cheesy but it seemed to work. I just hope this doesnt mean all of those guys are in an actual match?!! Sabin-Daniels was a pretty solid match, Lynn-Daniels has promise upcoming. I enjoyed Styles/Rhino alot from top to bottom. AJ was taking some seriously scary bumps when they were brawling in the crowd and the finish actually swerved me, I thought he was really injured. This feud definately has legs. AMW/LAX was also a very entertaining match with alot of memorable spots in it. Looks like Storm is going to be the heel in the breakup unless there is a swerve and Harris actually wasn't "hurt" by the glass. Interested to see where they go with those two on Thursday. The world title match certainly wasnt as good as it could be, but it still was alright, probably about ***. The finish was extremely botched though and shouldnt have ended the match - not sure if Sting didnt want to take the tack bump again or what, but it was certainly not a crisp finish. If anything could be said about this match as a whole, it was "sloppy". And what to say about Joe-Angle. I was one of the few who, last month, really enjoyed the match even if it only went 14 minutes. This one was even better, got a bit more time, and really was great. Alot of people have already commented on the positives of this match so no need to here. While having them work another match anytime soon is a bad idea, its clear another series of matches with these two down the road is in order, perhaps next BFG or something. At this point, Joe should start the climb back for the title, and as for Angle, who knows - I wouldnt mind seeing him and Sting at the next ppv, that is if Sting will still be around.

The show wasnt all that bad last night, and I thought the pacing wasnt too bad overall to really let things sink in more into what they are doing. Its a process still, though. If this show was spread out over two hours, though, I think, with the addition of a few more matches overall, it would have come across alot better still and throwing that main event in the right situation and with the right promotion would have been huge in the ratings and in just general, making this show stand out more as impressive. The VKM skits were kind of "eh", but not anything worse than any DX skits (nor better either though) - but hey, the Marine jab was pretty good. The Nash skit - I dunno, just to overtly and desperately trying to be funny to me. Petey-Cide had potential...Senshi and Young was an ok little match, but my god, I just can't believe how Senshi is being so casually thrown in this and that right now with zero direction. I did like the angles w/ LAX/AMW and Sting/Christian/Abyss though. Rest of the show was alright, I dont mind what they are doing with Abyss right now at all. And its most definately nice to see Jarrett not even so much as mentioned right now. Feels like most of the roster, in typical Russo form, is given a role on each show, which is tough to do for an hour deal. Downside to Russo right now is completely indicated with the main event. That match would be HUGE even on ppv if promoted right and ahead of time. If they had to do it on Impact, that should have been really pushed hard for weeks. Instead it was the definition of a hotshotted bout that really served little purpose. I just cannot get over how it was booked to have Angle over Joe again - there could have and should have been so many other more "protected" finishes here instead of that. In fact, that was probably the singlemost worse finish they could have booked. Is this just supposed to add built up aggression in Joe for the ppv in the storyline? Because it just makes him look more weak than anything. One huge positive though was the Joe/Angle video package hyping their match. Really came across well and added some interesting elements to the rematch, giving the impression that Angle is vulnerable as hell pertaining to Joe.