Bryan Staebell
Impact Recap for 1/30
The mystery investor was revealed to be MVP at the close of this week’s Impact, thus opening themselves up to an infinite stream of jokes that a former WWE midcarder could afford to buy TNA.
TNA was in Scotland this week (and next) with a hot crowd in a full arena. It made for a different feeling show. Unfortunately it featured the same booking.
Samoa Joe and Kurt Angle defeated Magnus and EC3 in the main event. Joe choked out Magnus to become the #1 contender to the TNA title. He’ll presumably be getting that shot at the Lockdown PPV. Until then he’ll be destroying EVERYONE. They have a lot of damage to undo to Joe but the way he’s been booked the last few weeks (and will be the next few) is a good start. They had a good match. They teased problems between Magnus and EC3 all night (yes, already). Had they lost, Angle and Joe would have been out of TNA like…well…everyone else lately. With the win, and finally beating Roode last week, Angle said he was ready to accept his Hall of Fame induction. All it took was going 1-4 against Roode and having his partner choke out the champion.
Gunner and James Storm aired their problems in the ring and settled their differences. They went on to beat Bad Influence in a pretty good match. The point of the match was to show that Storm has Gunner’s back now. Can’t imagine that going anywhere…
Bro Mans retained the TNA tag titles over Eric Young and Abyss when Abyss lost it and attacked the ref and his own partner. Young challenged him to a Monster’s Ball next week. There wasn’t much to the match but Bro Mans have become an entertaining act.
Velvet Sky and Madison Rayne beat Gail Kim and Lei’D Tapa in a super short match when Velvet pinned Gail. Weird choice for a finish. After the match Chris Sabin came out and demanded to know why Velvet has been avoiding him. She finally dumped him.
The Wolves (Davey Richards and Eddie Edwards) had a segment where they showed up and destroyed poor Rockstar Spud. They appeared again at the end of the show flanking the debuting MVP. At least they’re being positioned in a top story in the company right off the bat (because they are so in need of new talent that gets over) but they still won’t wrestle for another two weeks.
Bully Ray and Ken Anderson had a segment to set up a future casket match (which is also at least two weeks away). Ray got off a good line about how he’d LOVE to piledrive Anderson’s wife. They brawled. We’ve seen it all before. The match in a few weeks got some good notices though.
Bobby Roode started a new little story where Dixie promised him that he’d get a title shot at Lockdown after doing her bidding and being the reason that both AJ Styles and Sting are no longer in TNA. Dixie doesn’t hold up her end. This will lead to a few new wrinkles going forward…most of which seem to be TNA having a laugh at CM Punk’s expense.
Finally we had another pretty incredible Sam Shaw segment. This week we spied on Shaw and Christy Hemme getting close at his home and…well…just watch it:
I still don’t know how this stuff is going to get him over as a wrestler…but I’ll be damned if I’ve ever seen anything quite like it in wrestling.
This week was a decent show made better by a crowd very into it. The good news is they were into TNA and TNA stars. The bad news is they only go on this UK tour once a year. They’ve already announced 3 dates for next year in the UK.
Rockstar Spud continues to be a standout performer on this show.
Impact Preview for 2/6
This show was already taped in Scotland. Here is the non-spoiler match listing.
Kurt Angle vs. Magnus
Samoa Joe vs. Bobby Roode
Austin Aries vs. Zema Ion in an X title match (Ion cashes in his briefcase)
Abyss vs. Eric Young in a Monster’s Ball match
Random Droplets
TNA has ramped up their partnership with Wrestle 1 in Japan (which is frankly a little surprising given that Jeff Jarrett was the one behind that stuff). TNA will be filming a One Night Only PPV at a Wrestle 1 show where they will send Magnus, Bobby Roode, Bad Influence, The Wolves, Samoa Joe, Austin Aries, Abyss, Gail Kim and Madison Rayne to compete against the Wrestle 1 roster on March 2nd. On March 9th, The Great Muta and Seiya Sanada will be appearing at Lockdown. Sanada is the guy who AJ Styles beat when they sent him over to defend his version of the TNA title. Interestingly, TNA has a house show loop that weekend. It’s hard to believe they have enough of a roster to run split shows…but they do (barely). By my count they can send Bully Ray, Anderson, EC3, Rockstar Spud, Jeff Hardy (who should be back on TV right around then), Gunner, James Storm, Bro Mans, Zema Ion, Chris Sabin, Lei’D Tapa, ODB, Velvet Sky, Eric Young, Sam Shaw and MVP out there. Kurt Angle is going to be having surgery and will be out during this time. While most of the “top” guys will be in Japan…it’s actually kind of amazing how much of the crew left over has been a major part of television lately.
