Impact Wrestling: 7th February
The show opened with a segment from Garrett
Bischoff and Wes Briscoe explaining why they decided to join the Aces ‘N Eight,
Garrett in particular looked extremely poor on the microphone, Wes was slightly
better, arguing that he should be further up the ladder because of the Briscoe name, but neither exactly set the world on fire.
The first match
was an X-Divison title match between the champ Rob Van Dam and challengers
Kenny King and Xema Ion. This match gave a taster of just how good the
X-Division still is, there were several great moments, Ion’s Springboard 360 to
the outside and Kings corkscrew dive were particular highlights, but all in all
the match was too short, but I suspect it’s true purpose was to entice people
into paying to see them in a longer match at the next Pay Per View. Rob Van Dam
won after a frog splash onto King who was covering Zema, and then covering Zema
himself for the three count.
The second match
was James Storm making his obligatory angry redneck promo and then challenging
Jesse to a match. It’s no secret that I think that Storm is extremely overrated
and overused, but it’s Jesse that keeps impressing me. I thought his recent
match against Bully Ray showed us a little of what he can do, he certainly has
a capable wrestling ability. He’s got a great look and seems to have developed
a fairly strong character, i would certainly rather see him that Robbie E every
week that’s for sure. The match was, as expected, a short squash match which
ended in a victory for Storm.
Next, we were
treated to a match for the Tag Team belts between Hernandez and Chavo Guerrero
and the newly formed (Although heavily impressive) team of Austin Aries and
Bobby Roode. It seems to me that every one of Texmex’s matches are incredibly
similar and boring, basically Guerrero gets worked over for 10 minutes then
after a double clothesline that knocks both men out and he gets the desperation
tag to Hernandez who throws the guys around for a while before Guerrero comes
back in hits the Three Amigos and then the Frogsplash. I for one am pleased
that Aries and Roode have taken the belts and i hope they continue their good
work that we’ve seen thus far. They have fantastic chemistry and clearly work
well together.
The next match
was between Tara and Tessmacher in a non-title match. Tessmacher looked much
improved, showcasing a fairly well executed Hurricanerana. But she still seems
incredibly clunky and slow, at times it seemed like Tara had to slow down or
wait for Tessmacher to catch up to her. Despite this Tessmacher picked up the
win, marking the second time that Tara has been defeated in as many weeks. To
me it just seems wrong to make a champion look anything but dominant, they are
supposed to represent the elite in their division. To me the idea of any
Heel/Face feud is that the bad guy (or in this case girl) is meant to look
unbeatable so that when the face wins the title at the PPV it comes as a great
shock.
The next segment
i want to discuss is the unveiling of Rockstar Spud as the winner of British
Bootcamp, as a Brit I’ve had the privilege of watching Spud in the ring and the
American fans have a lot to look forward to in terms of in ring ability. In the
segment Robbie E interrupted Spud in order to criticise his size and ability,
at this point Rob Terry finally seemed to turn on Robbie E after weeks of
teasing the face turn.
The main event
was a tables match between the teams of Sting and Bully Ray and DOC and Devon
and was a good bit of fun. Bully Ray came out wearing face paint that was to
supposed to be reminiscent of Stings pre-crow days but ended up with Ray looking
like the third Road Warrior. In the match itself the Ace’s ‘N Eights looked
thoroughly beaten and hugely underwhelming, this is a group that is meant to be
causing havoc and creating difficulties for TNA but they are yet to look in any
way tough. If TNA wants the Aces ‘N Eights to succeed they have to start
winning matches...soon. The match essentially boiled down to Sting fighting DOC
and Mike Knox on the outside whilst Devon attacked the Bully, in which, rather
humorously Bully ‘Hulked’ up in style of his new Father in Law and planted
Devon through the table after a big boot.
Overall, the
quality of the matches for the X-Divison title and the Tag Team title were very
enjoyable. The filler matches were not so good, but they weren’t really meant
to be. Storylines advanced fairly well, it was far from the worst Impact I’ve
ever seen, but not the best either.
