The Impact Crater 09.13.07

Posted by Ryan Byers on 09.14.2007

This column is being written in a steel cage with barbed wire wrapped around the top, the only way to end it is with a preposition, and, if you can finish reading it in five minutes, you get a shot at the TNA Title. Oh, and Bruno Sammartino is outside the cage as a special guest enforcer.

Welcome, one and all, to the Impact Crater. We're in the final three weeks of Imapct being a one hour program, and we're roughly a month away from Bound for Glory, which TNA promotes as being its biggest show of the year despite the fact that they have never done anything to make it stand out as the biggest show of the year. With new talent coming in, new championships being created, and Pac-Man Jones still running around, this promises to be a memorable time in the promotion's history, even if it is for all of the wrong reasons. That said, let's head to the show.



Quick & Dirty Results

Segment #1: Kurt Angle/Karen Angle/Sting interview segment
Segment #2: Chocolate Reign def. Shark Boy
Segment #3: Christopher Daniels def. Jay Lethal in a non-title match
Segment #4: Christian/Matt Morgan interview segment
Segment #5: Kurt Angle went to a no contest with Abyss in a non-title "I Quit" loser leaves town cage match. NON-TITLE I QUIT LOSER LEAVES TOWN CAGE MATCH. THAT ENDED IN A NO CONTEST. I hate this company.

Angle Numero Uno: Somebody Buy Kurt a VCR

Sting and Kurt Angle are headed to the main event at Bound for Glory with the TNA Title on the line. I have no problem with this match being selected to main event the show. However, I do have to question how the match was set up. The entire premise here is that Angle is angry with Sting because he is laboring under the false belief that Sting slapped Karen during a recent Tag Team Title match. Sting claims that he did not slap the woman, and, in fact, video evidence proves that he never laid a hand on her. Despite this fact, Kurt still believes that Mr. Borden knocked the taste out of his bride's mouth. Apparently TNA wants us to believe that their World Heavyweight Champion is so stupid (or so whipped) that he will immediately accept his wife's word in this situation without even bothering to take the five minutes necessary to review the tape of the match. Furthermore, Sting is so stupid that he's not going to suggest that Kurt watch the tape. He's not even going to get the monkeys in the production truck to roll the footage while the Angles and the Stinger are having a confrontation in the ring. I understand that this is professional wrestling and that conflict needs to be resolved in the ring, but let's at least try to create a conflict that couldn't be resolved by ten minutes of polite discussion and tape review. This would all make much more sense if Sting had inadvertently struck Karen. At least then Kurt could believe that the slap was intentional despite Sting's protests.

With that said, if the company is going to go with the ridiculous "Kurt thinks Sting decked her!" story, the interview segment that they did at the top of the show was a very good way to kick it off. Karen Angle is an absolutely phenomenal promo despite the fact that she's only been involved in the business for a couple of months. Sting and Angle also played their roles well. Furthermore, the idea of Kurt handcuffing Sting to the ropes and Karen slapping him is the perfect sort of attack to have this early in the rivalry. It gives Sting a reason to go after Angle in the future, but it's not giving away too much physicality within the feud's first few days. There is still an opportunity for the violence in the feud to build instead of beginning with the two exchanging fisticuffs for four solid weeks. The only negative about the segment was the complete and utter lack of heat from the crowd, which I can't explain. Despite the fact that the interview and attack were done well by all of the parties involved, the fans in attendance couldn't have cared less. That's not a good sign for the next couple of Impact episodes given that this was the first thing recorded during a three-hour taping session.

Also, though it is a tangential point, I'd just like to note that the Bound for Glory main event is NOT Kurt Angle versus Samoa Joe. Though I don't think that the PPV main should be another Angle/Joe match, I want to point this out because, when I criticized the company for putting Angle over Joe in their last encounter, numerous people responded to my criticism with "Well, yeah, but TNA will give Joe the World Title at BFG because that's their biggest show of the year." Looks like I was right and all of those folks were wrong. I hate to say that I told you so, but . . .

Angle Numero Dos: Attack of the Killer Stips

When I heard about the main event for this week's show, I wanted to take a corkscrew and jam it in to my right ear as hard as humanly possible. Abyss took on Kurt Angle in a NON-TITLE I QUIT LOSER LEAVES TOWN CAGE MATCH. Stipulations mean nothing when ten of them are piled up on top of each other like this. Stipulation matches also mean nothing when they're given away with no build whatsoever, as was the case here. Yet, I do have to give TNA little bit of credit, because at least they had Mike Tenay attempt to explain why we were getting all of these stips, whereas in TNA's dumbest days they wouldn't even have bothered to do that. Of course, there was a small problem in that Tenay's explanation made no sense. Let's see if we can't go through it line-by-line:

~ First of all, he claims that Abyss wants the match and doesn't mind that it's non-title because this is all about getting revenge. What does Abyss have to be angry about? Angle beat him as clean as a whistle in the middle of the ring at the pay per view. If Abyss is mad about that, he's a poor sport.

~ Tenay then explains that Abyss' career is on the line because Jim Cornette asked Abyss what he would be willing to do in order to get the match signed. Apparently Abyss is a moron who has never watched TNA before, because 90% of the time all somebody has to do to get Cornette to sign a match is to say, "It'll be good for ratings." Instead, he decides that he's going to put his career up. And what's he putting it up against? NOTHING, because the match is non-title.

~ The match was supposedly in a cage because Karen Angle has interfered in some of Kurt's matches. Okay, that starts to approach logical, but the fact of the matter is that none of Karen's interference has come during matches involving Abyss. The cage is traditionally used to blow off a feud in which interference has actually affected that specific angle.

~ I don't think that the "I Quit" stip was ever explained, though presumably it had something to do with the fact that Kurt made Abyss tap on the PPV. As such, I'd have no problem with that one in isolation, but it's annoying when it gets lumped on top of seven hundred other stipulations.

Then, with all of these stipulations – two of which (the cage and the submission rules) are supposed to guarantee that we have a decisive victor in the match – TNA gives us a NO CONTEST. A no contest in a submission cage match . . . and this company wonders why nobody cares about any of their big pay per view events.

But that's not all, folks! It wasn't just this show that was swarming with ridiculous gimmick matches. Apparently the next pay per view has a load of them as well. Though I'm glad that TNA is getting the PPV card out there early, I can't imagine a more mind boggling lineup than this one. Let's take a look at what we have:

~ First and foremost, the return of the shitty, shitty Reverse Battle Royale. I ranted ad nauseum about the first installment of this match, and I wasn't alone. In fact, the original Reverse Battle Royale was voted 2006's worst match of the year by readers of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter. (Keep in mind that the Great Khali wrestled numerous matches in 2006). Yet, for some reason, TNA decided that it would be a brilliant idea to bring it back for the pay per view. Get ready for more shots of the most athletic wrestlers in the world pretending that they're too exhausted to climb in to the ring, a task that my arthritic grandmother could perform on her worst day.

~ Then there's a Gauntlet Match (Royal Rumble) to crown TNA's first Women's Champion. I wouldn't have a problem with this one on its own. In fact, I'd quite be looking forward to it. However, do we really need a Royal Rumble and a Reverse Battle Royale? The gimmicks are too similar, and they probably shouldn't be taking place on the same show.

~ An Ultimate X Match between Triple X and LAX. Why? I know that this will probably be an awesome contest, but why? If these two teams are going to be involved in a major gimmick match, shouldn't there have at least been an issue between them before the contest was announced? At the very least you could've put the number one contendership at stake so that they would have some reason to be fighting.

In short, this promotion confounds me sometimes. Okay, not sometimes. All of the time.

Angle Numero Tres: "The Samoan Swat Team . . . one's overweight, and the other's Fatu." – Michael P.S. Hayes

Not surprisingly, Samoa Joe's feud with Christian is continuing. They'll be squaring off at the pay per view, with Matt Morgan acting as the special guest enforcer at ringside. At least this is a case in which the stipulation makes some sense in the context of the feud, as Joe legitimately did go crazy at the last PPV, meaning that some extra muscle around ringside is necessary. This also appears to be heading in to a Matt Morgan versus Samoa Joe feud, and, being a fan of both guys, I have no problem with that one.

Of course, the other big piece of news here is the debut of the artist formerly known as Rikishi, who was selected by Jim Cornette when Christian challenged him to book the Instant Classic in a match against any Samoan that he could find. Personally, I'm on the fence about Rikishi, and my opinion on his coming to TNA will be determined entirely by whether he decides to wear his working boots in the promotion. When he's been motivated, he's been one of the better big men in United States wrestling scene. However, there have also been periods of his career during which he was seemingly happy to coast by on his dancing gimmick and his stink face spot. If we get the former, I'll be a happy camper. If we get the latter, he's probably a bigger waste of money than any other former WWE talent that TNA has brought through its doors. Well, except maybe for Christy Hemme.

And the Rest . . .

~ This whole thing with Dustin Rhodes and his rat really confuses me. Is a rat touching somebody supposed to be offensive? If that's the angle you're going for, could you try to at least make the rat look somewhat dirty? Please? The rodent Chocolate Reign is carrying around looks like a domesticated rat that you can purchase in any pet store in the country. That's not scary. That's like Evad Sullivan laying his rabbit on you.

~ So Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man hold the Tag Team Titles. They're heels. AJ Styles and Travis Tomko are the number one contenders. They're heels. Can somebody give me one good reason why a face team didn't win the tag gauntlet at the PPV?

~ I'm not a fan of the jobbing out of Jay Lethal here tonight. It's a classic way to display that a man is ready for a title shot, but the timing was poor coming off of Lethal's big win at the PPV. He needs to build momentum after beating Angle, not immediately lose to somebody so that his title victory looks like a fluke.

Overall

On the whole, this wasn't a terrible show. As previously mentioned, I liked the build that they did for Angle/Sting, even if the entire feud is premised on a ridiculous concept. Additionally, the Cage/Joe angle continues to roll along nicely, though they're treading dangerously close to overbooking the rivalry by inserting Morgan. Though it is true that the stipulations for the main event of this show were outlandish and had no place on a wrestling program, at least they only tainted this program and are not something that will have negative consequences on Impact episodes for the next three weeks. My main problem coming out of this show is the lineup for the pay per view, which contains so many senseless gimmick matches that it could wind up being one of the worst shows in history if the two main events don't deliver. Thus, even though it was not great and the promotion still has its problems, this episode of Impact didn't leave me filled with nearly as much rage as other editions of the program have, so they're improving somewhat.

Reader Feedback

We've only got one e-mail of note this week, from John R., perhaps our most frequent guest:

For quite some time now TNA has done a horrible job of building effective feuds and angles on Impact leading up to their PPVs. I believe after the atrocity that was Hard Justice they finally realized this and for the past two weeks built up effective episodes reflecting this change.

Case in point, going into No Surrender there are only a few headline matches which received the most build up: Roode-Kaz, Christian-Joe, Angle's three title defenses. Roode doesn't need to be around Christian's group all the time, and that association will probably end after what transpired between him and Tomko at the end of the match.

As for Samoa Joe, I don't like the way they've been booking him as an underdog instead of a dominant beast as well, but I'm going to hold off on judging this as a failure until after Sunday. I'm hoping that what happened on Impact will only anger him and have him be the first person to pin Christian on Sunday, thus leading him back into the World title scene.

Speaking of which, I like the fact that Abyss pinned Angle to at least put some doubt in the fans' minds that this will be a match worth watching. I don't mind them taking a back seat on the other two title matches for the sake of the Tag Team Titles match. I just don't understand how they're going to pull this off unless Angle screws Sting leaving him to a beatdown by Team PacMan. I think in the end Angle will walk out with both the X-Division and World Titles.

As for the other matches, they aren't really significant and should've been treated as such. Harris-Black Reign (or whatever) is filler, the Tag Team gauntlet is minor because it should build up for a title showdown at BFG, and as funny as Storm's vignettes have been, his match with Rhino is not that big unless Rhino finally figures out how to win a PPV match.

Keep up the great work!

You're right, the build for this PPV was much better than the build to the last one. There are still a few issues that need to be addressed, but, after months of watching one of the worst professional wrestling products that I've ever seen, I'll give a thumbs up to any improvement, no matter how slight.

Unfortunately, it does look like a couple of your predictions wound up not happening. Though the finish to the Joe/Christian match did make our Samoan friend look like more of a monster than he has in months, I'm still sick and tired of this company refusing to let the guy just win a match. A wrestler can beat people up and beat people up and beat people up, but fans still won't buy him as a legitimate threat to any championship unless the beatings result in victories. I'm hoping that his actions on the PPV lead to a heel turn, because that may be the best way to revitalize Joe's career, as it will keep him away from further being established as Kurt Angle's bitch.

As far as Angle's titles are concerned, unless the company was going to strip him, it was probably best for him to lose both the Tag and X Division Titles at the pay per view. Some people were already complaining that three Angle matches on one show was overexposure. The number of folks complaining would only grow as he spent more time as the top dog in multiple divisions.

And so concludes another Impact Crater. Before we go, though, I've got a bit of a homework assignment for my loyal readers. As you are all aware, TNA will be adding a second hour to Impact beginning next month. I've been trying to figure out how to format this column after the second hour is tacked on, and I'd like to know what you, the readers, think is best. I used to do the Crater as a traditional review of the show, with play by play that was interspersed with my comments on the program. After about six months, I realized that most Impact segments (particularly matches) were so short that play by play didn't accomplish much and was highly repetitive when read on a weekly basis. Thus, I switched over to the current format, which is just a straight analysis of the booking with no play by play at all. Presumably, the second hour being added to the show will allow for some longer matches, so there once again may be value in doing a more traditional review.

With that said, these are the ideas that I'm currently kicking around in my head:

1.) Keep the column exactly the way that it is now.

2.) Revert the column to a traditional review with play by play and opinions intertwined with one another.

3.) Continue to omit play by play from the column but add an additional section which critiques the in-ring quality of lengthy (i.e. not squash) matches.

Feel free to drop me a line and let me know which one of these alternatives you prefer . . . or, if you've got an idea that you don't see here, go ahead and suggest it.

I'll be back on Sunday with the Custom Made News Report. Until then, take it easy.