wrestling / TV Reports
Tremendous Tirades 3.10.13: TNA Lockdown 2013
Introduction
It’s the road to WrestleMania, and with that being the case, I have dusted off the old Tremendous Tirades name for new alternate recap to the main shows that will air each week (Raw, Impact and Smackdown). This will not be another traditional recap, but instead it will be a mash up of the Rs, Instant Analysis and my usual Twitter ramblings I would do during the shows; completely uncensored and as the ideas flow unfiltered to the old keyboard.
I have a few things to comment on here before the PPV. First of al, for those that have enjoyed the recaps, I am glad and I have appreciated the feedback. For those that have disliked the recaps, at least give me a reason as to why toy disliked it instead of, “this sucks,” because if it is legit, I will try and work on it.
TNA dropping the ball with Bobby Roode is exactly the situation that keeps this promotion looking bush-league. I don’t expect TNA to be on WWE’s level as far as their overall status. I want TNA to put on good shows and show some basic understanding of business. If a talent has to come to YOU and explain that their contract is running out, that is a problem. And this isn’t Robbie E or some low card guy; this is a former world champion and a guy you are still making a major investment in as far as TV time goes. If what is being reported is true, which is that his contact expiring was Bruce Prichard’s fault, then TNA needs to fire Prichard. They are honestly lucky that WWE didn’t swoop in and sign Roode, just to fuck with them. Something has reportedly been worked out between the sides, and that is a good thing, but it never should have come to that.
As for tonight’s PPV, I have to admit, while some elements of the show interest me; I am not feeling the hype for this show. I feel that TNA poorly used their eight weeks to build to the show, as evidence of how they booked the X-Division match, the Robbie E vs. Rob Terry match and the Joe Ryan vs. Joe Park match; which are all either booked way late, have poor booking or were just not needed. I think that for this PPV to succeed, it will have to be the talent saving the creative team’s ass by delivering good performances.
Finally, will the Aces and 8s angle be ending tonight, will it continue to limp along, or will they salvage it? We shall find out!
Tonight’s show takes place at the Alamodome in San Antonio, TX. According to Dixie Carter, this is the largest TNA crowd in history for the company…
X-Division Title Match: Kenny King © vs. Christian York vs. Zema Ion: Next to your main event, the opener is always the most important match on PPV. You either have to have characters or a feud that people are heavily invested in, or a match that will catch the attention of the crowd. This falls into category two. Scary spot early in the match as King tried to moonsault to the floor (off of the back on Ion who was in the ropes) and under rotated and crashed back of his head first into the barricade. Careful dude, I don’t need to see a guy die on PPV, and with Kurt Angle still to come, I’m not out of the woods yet. They did some really fun spot, including a new variation on the tower of doom, a doomsday blockbuster and a top rope RANA spot from Ion, where he perfectly landed in a moonsault onto the other man that was laid out. I thought Ion really stood out in the match, as he was just on tonight; and his level of douchebaggery as a heel is also great. The match had some of those annoying “slow set up” spots, and when York gets tired, he looks like he is moving in slow motion. Some sloppiness early, but the innovations were appreciated. King retained the title by pinning York in a solid PPV opener.
Match Rating: **¾
Joey Ryan vs. Joseph Park: The fact that this was thrown onto the PPV with no build what so ever shows that even by dropping eight PPVs, TNA still has no clue how to build a PPV. Before our match, Ryan cut a promo, insulted the fans, insulted Park and said he had a big dick. Park then cut a promo, saying San Antonio rocks to get the face pop, Ryan attacked and we were underway. It was the comedy match you would expect, the people that love the Park character likely loved this, I am not in that camp and feel that it didn’t deserve a place on the PPV. This stuff is better served for Impact. Joseph Park pinned Joey Ryan.
Match Rating: *½
Knockouts Title Match: Velvet Sky © vs. Gail Kim: Taryn, Christy, Gail and Velvet; there’s a lot of talent in that ring. And some of them can wrestle. At one point Kim legit landed a knee to the head of Sky, who let out a pretty loud, “Ow shit!’ Most of the match was solid as Kim controlled the action, and she is very good at what she does. The story going in was that Kim accused Taryn Terrell of being a biased official, so you knew that it would lay into the match, and it did. Gail slapped her after a near fall and that led to Taryn spearing and beating the piss out of Gail. Her extensions were flying out during this whole thing. Sky recovered, hit her finish and retained the title. This may be the avenue to get Taryn into the ring as a wrestler in the near future. This was fine. Velvet Sky retained the title by pinning Gail Kim.
Match Rating: **
Robbie E vs. Rob Terry: This is about what you would expect from the match, comedy from Robbie E, power stuff from Rob Terry and that was that. Not very good, felt like a below average TV match. Rob Terry defeated Robbie E via pin.
Match Rating: *
Tag Team Title Match: Austin Aries and © vs. Bad Influence vs. Chavo and Hernandez: And thankfully the PPV picked up with a match I thought would be good, and thankfully was. I felt that the match was laid out well to allow all three teams to shine at different times. They got about 17-minutes, and with the three way formula were able to keep the action at a high level through out. The local crowd was into this more than anything, largely due to Chavo and Hernandez (which is why they were in there). They didn’t do much between Aries & Roode vs. Daniels & Kazarian; which I figure was by design as that should be the next program for the titles. The end saw Roode get the sneaky tag as Chavo was going for the frog splash. He then allowed him to hit it on Daniels, Aries tossed Chavo and Roode got the pin. This was easily the best thing on the show thus far. Bobby Roode and Austin Aries retain the tag team titles as Roode pins Daniels
Match Rating: ***¾
Steel Cage Match: Wes Briscoe vs. Kurt Angle: You know how you hear that wrestler A walked wrestler B through a match, well that is what happened here. Unfortunately this was not your typical Kurt Angle PPV effort, as he worked hard, but was so focused on working with Wes’ limitations, that the match never hit that next level outside of a few Angle spots like the German off the ropes and such. Angle got two visual victories following a ref bump, one where Wes tapped to the ankle lock, and the other after he escaped the cage. Unfortunately for Angle, D Lo hit the scene and beat down Angle, tossed him back into the cage and then pulled Wes out, which allowed him to win the match. Yes, we’re building to a Kurt Angle vs. D Lo Brown battle of the former Euro-Continental Champions. The good news I that the crowd reacted well to the screw job finish, with some decent heat on Aces and 8s for once. The match was really all Kurt Angle working Briscoe through a pretty good effort with Briscoe bumping well for Angle. Not a star making performance for Briscoe, but also not a bad one either. Thankfully Angle didn’t do anything really stupid, instead opting to work smarter and safer. Wes Briscoe defeated Kurt Angle via escaping the cage
Match Rating: **¼
Lethal Lockdown: Team TNA (Sting, Joe, Magnus, Young and Storm) vs. Aces and 8s (Bischoff, Devon, DOC, Knux and Anderson): I loved that they gave Magnus the #1 spot for his team, as the guy has star potential and a match like this allows for star performances. The early portion of the match was the basic set up, faces control and then get overrun by the numbers game, rise and repeat; but that was fine because that’s the basic structure of the match. Magnus had a good performance, but the match just wasn’t designed to let him shine, but again, he continues to perform well.
TNA didn’t announce it before hand, but the dropped the roof gimmick on the Lethal Lockdown match. Instead, Sting was the last man out and carried out trashcans of plunder ala New Jack in ECW. Anticlimactic to say the least since the roof coming down was a big gimmick of the match for years. Team TA cleaned house for many minutes with the weapons until EY almost hit Sting by accident, which allowed Aces and 8s to fight back. They then did an insane six-man tower of doom spot, which was car crash great. Team TNA made the comeback, Sting got the death drop on Knux and then told EY to head to the top of the cage. He dropped the huge elbow drop and Team TNA defeated the MidCard Mafia via pin. Unless there is a big angle coming in the main event, I just cannot see how this angle keeps on going when Aces and 8s constantly get beat like a drum week in and out. The match was good, the crowd liked the weapons because they do not get them a lot; but it wasn’t a “great match” that people will remember down the line. Tenay selling the victory for TNA as monumental would have meant something, again, if Aces and 8s had been dominating TNA. Also, the pure look of joy on Samoa Joe’s face as he threw multiple trashcans at Garett Bischoff was hilarious. Again, this was a fun match, good for the style it was and had a hot crowd; but if you’re not shooting a big angle in the main event, I just have no clue what you do with Aces and 8s.
Match Rating: ***¼
TNA World Title Match: Jeff Hardy © vs. Bully Ray: Quick note, I hate that over the last few years TNA has switched from the pin or submission only to the escape the cage is ok as well rules. I like the real finish in cage matches, and felt the difference between their cage matches and WWE cage matches was a good thing. Anyway, they had a fine beginning and Jeff looked to end things early with the Twist of Fate. But as he went for the swanton, they did the big tease with Aces and 8s members Biscoe and Bischoff entering the cage. But Bully Ray and Jeff worked together to fight them off and toss them to the floor. In what looked completely awesome, Ray hit a top rope sit out powerbomb on Jeff for a near fall. After that, Brooke and Hulk came out to root on Bully Ray, “you gotta get up brother! Don’t stop brother!” This again led to Aces and 8s coming out and Ray and Jeff going back to back to fight them off… but Devon threw a hammer to Ray, and he laid out Jeff with it. They hugged it out and Ray covered for the win. Bully Ray defeated Jeff Hardy to win the TNA World Title.
Bully Ray celebrated with his brothers in Aces and 8s as Brooke threw a fit ringside, and that led to Ray calling Hulk an old bastard and saying that Brooke meant nothing to him. Ray then got on the mic and said to let the stupid bitch cry. Bully told Hulk that he used him and that he screwed Brooke. The crowd then started to litter the cage with beer cans, cups and trash as Ray gloated that he fooled every single one of the fans. It felt like that was set up to give the closing angle that nWo feeling when Hogan turned. Ray then declared that he was the president of Aces and 8s, and the new world champion.
I can’t call it a great match, but what they did was good. But this was all about the angle with Bully Ray, which did come off well. The people were pissed that he turned on Jeff, Brooke, Hulk and TNA.
Match Rating: ***
This was a real mixed bag of a show. There wasn’t a lot of great wrestling, but a few good matches (tag title, Lethal Lockdown and the main event were good) but nothing that makes you have to see the show from that standpoint. Also, I feel that if the plan was to have Ray win the title, then Aces and 8s certainly should have won the Lethal Lockdown match, to give them a clean sweep and their first real momentum as a stable. While the show had an eventful ending, I do not feel that it was worth paying $35 for. Maybe if there were some better matches on the show that would have helped, but a lot of things came off as average at best. I cannot recommend a replay. Show Rating: 5.5 As a reminder, I will be going by the 411 scale… 0 – 0.9: Torture As a reminder, this is not a basic “how good was the show” number like a TV show, as I have always felt that a PPV is very different from a regular show. I have always judged PPV on how they built to a match, the match quality, crowd reactions to matches and angles, the overall booking, how the PPV leads into the future, PPV price and so on and so forth. I have added this in here for an explanation since so many have asked, and I have previously discussed it on podcasts. I understand that this may seem different, but that is how I grade. Obviously your criteria may be different. |
What Did You Think of TNA Lockdown 2013?
Lindsay Lohan, before the drugs…
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Larry Csonka is a Pisces and enjoys rolling at jiu jitsu class with Hotty McBrownbelt, cooking, long walks on the beach, Slingo and the occasional trip to Jack in the Box. He is married to a soulless ginger and has two beautiful daughters who are thankfully not soulless gingers; and is legally allowed to marry people in 35 states. He has been a wrestling fan since 1982 and has been writing for 411 since May 24th, 2004; contributing over 3,000 columns, TV reports and video reviews to the site.
