The Best Of The Rest 3.12.08: Volume 35 - Destination X, Jeff Hardy's Suspension, ROH's Weekend and More

Posted by Alex Mattis on 03.12.2008

My thoughts on Destination X, Jeff Hardy's suspension, ROH huge weekend, and more right here on "The Best Of The Rest!"

Hello again, and welcome to "The Best Of The Rest!" I hope all is well since we last met, I'm sure it's not if your name is Jeff Hardy. TNA put on a solid event this past weekend, can they continue to do so? ROH has got some goins-ons this weekend, and like always tidbits from the MMA world all here on the BOTR.

Thought's on Destination X:
TNA pumped out a good PPV this past Sunday, in which the main event had a...CLEAN FINISH!!! I know, I was shocked too. But seriously, this PPV was better than I expected and doesn't deserve the level of criticism that TNA has been facing lately. It's true that the company is screwing many things up with their TV show and characters, but if they can put out more PPV's like this (minus the Fish Market Street Fight) they could turn a corner and get past this hideous phase they are going through. The night started out with my favorite match of the show, a 3-way tag match between The Rock N' Rave Connection, LAX, and The Motor City Machine Guns. This match had a furious pace and some great spots. I cannot say enough about how awesome Hotstuff Hernandez is, this guy is the shit and some of the spots he had in the match proved it. The fact he can do a suicide dive in the first place is crazy, the fact that he landed on his feet after doing the dive is straight up pimp. It was a great spot, that came across great on TV. Then he held Hoyt up in that suplex for about the length of November Rain, followed all that up with a spleen-splitting Border Toss on Rave. It was clear that Hernandez was the MVP of the match, but it was a great effort from all the wrestlers involved. Quick side question, am I the only one who loves Don West marking out for the Tope Con Hilo? He's like a freakin' kid. Next up we had another excellent match for the X Division title. In my column last week I said that Petey and Lethal could have a great match if TNA let them do their thang, well I guess TNA is a loyal reader of "The Best Of The Rest" because that's exactly what they did. There was, of course, interference and whatnot but it went along well with the match and didn't take away from the wrestling. Points of the match were very convincing, as I though Petey had it won several times. Onto Kaz and Eric Young vs. Rellik and Black Reign, the match had nothing really going for it but I will ignore that fact because the debut of Super Eric was so spectacular. Csnoka was right, it was so bad it was funny. Props to Young for showing some serious strength getting both those guys up for a DVD. Next on the card was the triple threat match for the TNA women's title. Next to the 3-way tag this was definitely one of the best matches of the night. All three worked very well together and the booking of the match was perfect. All three looked good, but in the end Kong looked unstoppable. I will give TNA one thing, they treat the women's division with respect and let the women do their thing in the ring and this match was proof of that. When is the last time you saw a women's match that good in the E? I think it was around this point in the PPV that we got the genius backstage promo with Jim Cornette, the Angle Alliance, and Team 3D. It was gold! The line from Bubba asking Cornette why he screws the "good guys" was brilliant. And Tomko's classic "I saw that!" line stole the show for me. Back to the wrestling. We had the "Fish Market Street Fight" it was here that I realized that Christopher Daniels is the worst utilized wrestler in the world today. TNA is missing a lot of opportunities with him. The match itself was a joke, but hey these guys did what they could and worked hard. I didn't like the strap match at all, I was really disapointed as I feel the two could put on a great match but just haven't found their stride yet. Again props need to go out, this time to Traci Brooks for taking that hellacious whipping, I was cringing watching it. The Elevation X match wasn't nearly as good as it was last year, but I still give props to those involved for having the balls to do that. I hope Storm didn't hurt himself too bad on that fall, it looked like a pretty sick bump. The main event of the night was pretty much what I expect and it turned out pretty good. It was great to finally have a clean finish to a PPV. I thought the teams involved worked really well together, especially the Angle Alliance; that Pele to a big boot to an Angle Slam was excellent. Now we have Joe-Angle... again. I'm praying, again, that it is finally time for Joe to get the strap. But we'll talk about that more in the weeks to come.

It was probably just sugar left over from a powdered doughnut...
Jeff Hardy is on the chemical wagon AGAIN! And this time it cost him worse than ever before. Not only will he suspended for 60 days, which is a long time in the wrestling world, but this enormous push he has been getting will come to an immediate hault. People ask me why I don't like this guy all the time, well here's reason #45278. How the hell are you going to throw away a potential title reign, not only that but Hardy has been dominating the airwaves as of late and has become one of the main players on Raw. Welp, 'tis no more. This guy obviously has a problem as this is not a new issue with Jeff, it's starting to resemble the Scott Hall story. I'm surprised that it wasn't like the last time this happened, with all his tardiness and such. Well I hope this breif layoff gives him time to get his shit together. I may not care for Jeff Hardy and I think delving into drugs during this stage of his career was absolutely idiotic, but I don't wish bad things upon him and hope he can get control of this situation and get things back on track.

R(OH)-andom Ramblings:
-I finally saw the latest installment of the ROH video wire over the weekend, and witness the much talked about unmasking of Jigsaw. The jury is yet to reach the verdict as to whether or not I like the unmasking angle, but I will say it was done very well and I think this could be the beginning of something very good for Jigsaw. This could work wonders for him if his career goes in a serious direction from here.

-A big weekend is upcoming for ROH as this weekend they'll be pulling a triple shot filled with some great matches. On Friday night we'll see some qualifying matches for a huge four corner survival on Sunday with the winner getting a shot at the belt. The first match will be Delirious Vs. The Necro Butcher... come on how could that be bad? I think this match is going to be a blast. Then in the second qualifying match of the night Go Shiozaki will take on Brent Albright. I'm anxious to see what happens here as I am new to Shiozaki, I've only seen the match he had with Danielson last year. Also on the card is a match that I'm very interested to see as it is a serious contrast in styles, Davey Richards Vs. Kevin Steen. It could be great, but at the same time their styles could mesh in an unfavorable fashion. Saturday night on this huge weekend will see two more qualifying matches when Claudio Castagnoli takes on Davey Richards and Tyler Black faces Erick Stevens. But also on the card is a stacked main event, it'll be Bryan Danielson & Austin Aries vs. Nigel McGuinness & Go Shiozaki this one should be awesome. Night 3 ROH will tape yet another PPV and in the main event it will be the winner of the four corner survival against Nigel McGuinness for the ROH world title. This is a huge weekend for ROH, and I expect them to pull out all the stops on all the shows.

The Stoppage:
-Just like a prostitute fresh out of jail, it seems that Fedor is back on the market and ready to start turning armbar's for the highest paying sugar daddy. The relationship between Fedor and M-1 last about as long as Carmen Electra and Dennis Rodman, a quit submission of Hong Man Choi and that was it. Where does the (arguable) best fighter in the world go from here? Well I, like many, hope that the M-1 deal was just a detour on the road to the UFC. There aren't many other options for Fedor. Number 1: If he wants to prove he truly is the best, then he has to fight the best. Number 2: If he wants to defend his PRIDE heavyweight title he has to go to the UFC. Best case scenario now is that Fedor signs with the UFC, Couture comes back and honors his final fight, we have a fight to unify the PRIDE and UFC heavyweight titles, then the winner faces Nog to determine the "undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. Outside of the UFC there is only one fight for Fedor, Josh Barnett. Within the UFC we could see some awesome things like Fedor Vs. Couture (finally), and better yet I would LOVE to see Fedor Vs. Tim Sylvia, primarily to shut Tim up. Who knows how this is going to turn out, but as a huge fan of Fedor I hope the best case scenario works out because I want to see Fedor fight some actual competition. I'm tired of Fedor fighting for Campbell's.


-I'll tell you something that's not so fresh... Ken Shamrock's face. Coming off the heels of his 5 loss in a row, all 5 of which were (T)KO's within the first round, Shamrock is hitting the "depressing" stage of his career. Especially when you take into consideration that this is a man who is highly regard as a pioneer of the sport, and one of the first to be inducted into the UFC hall of fame. Losing to "Buzz" Berry on such a small show is about as low as this ol' timer can hit before he reaches the Tank Abbott level. Shammy really needs to rethink his life at this point, because the career is no more. Some serious health problems could be knocking out Kenny's door if he doesn't wise up. It's fine for him to train people and what not, but he is far past the days where he could actually compete in legit MMA.

-Bad news struck the MMA world when we found out that Shogun re-injured his knee and would have to pull out of his fight with Chuck Liddell, so now stepping into Shogun's spot is one Rashad Evans. DAMMIT!!! Why does this piss me off? Well one, this fight will be no where near as exciting as the Shogun-Iceman fight would have been and two, I was really looking forward to the Rashad Evans-Thiago Silva fight. Well piss. Now what we'll have is Rashad trying take Chuck down, until he gets caught... which won't take long. Liddell in the first via murder. The plus side of this is that fact that Rashad is a top ranked LHW, and the more ranked fighters Chuck beats the closer he comes to Liddell-Rampage III.

Well that's all for me this week. Thanks for reading, and I'll see you right back here next time.

Feedback, as always, is welcome at [e-mail] or below with that nifty comment box.

*This Week's YouTube Sendoff*

^Awesome vid!^

-Alex