I just thought of this, MVP has gone from being a top wrestler to being ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, my name is MVP.’ Yes, over the last few months, ever since he hurt his knee, he has become Paul Heyman to Bobby Lashley’s Brock Lesnar. All the parallels are there, except for Kenny King.
Hell, in the opening segment tonight, MVP even called Lashley the future Bellator MMA champion.
As has become a normal thing, we open Impact with MVP and crew. MVP dominated the mic and put Lashley over as the toughest guy in the city, state, even the world. (Similar to Brock Lesnar's baddest motherfucker on the planet promo).
This brought out Samoa Joe, who challenged Lashley to a match. After a three on one beat down, Lashley accepted Joe’s challenge for later in the night.
Decent opening that set up a pivotal match for the night and possible world title feud. But, could this be an angle to have Lashley squash Joe and make him look even tougher?
TNA Knockouts title match. Gail Kim defended against Taryn Terrell. A serviceable, but not great match. This was a much better make than last week’s Taryn versus Madison match. Definitely not the ‘This is Awesome’ match chant the crowd gave it.
Yes, there was one memorable spot where Gail did a neck breaker onto the steel steps, but I think she hurt herself more than Taryn.
In the end, Gail retained, as she should have. With all due respect to Taryn, she is not in Gail’s league and I don’t know why they are pushing her so much, she is the weakest of the knockouts.
The mutual respect shown at the end of the match was nice though, which was destroyed by the debut of Havok (didn’t know the character was female) who laid out both Taryn and Gail.
Havok has arrived . . . should the knockouts be worried?
Strong Promo from EC3 demanding that Bully Ray be fired and the words Hardcore and Extreme be eliminated from the TNA vocabulary. I love how he says ‘I disagree’ when the crowds chant ‘You can’t wrestle.’
Rhino gained some measure of vengeance, attacking EC3 after coming out of the crowd, which set up a match between Rhino and Rockstar Spud later in the evening.
This was a strong promo from EC3, the anger and malice dripped from him. As I have said before, EC3 has arrived. EC3 also had a great improve moment when the crowd started chanting CM Punk and EC3 responded, ‘I’d love to beat him too.’
In the back, Shaw apologized to Gunner for wearing his uniform last week, telling Gunner he wanted to know what it was like being a hero like Gunner. In the background, a woman kept staring at Shaw.
Don’t you love that it takes wrestlers a full weak to deal with issues?
This is follow by a decent tag match between Gunner/Shaw and Magnus/Bram, which saw Bram get the pin fall victory on Gunner. It was a little bit of an odd match, considering how Shaw become overly protective of Gunner twice in the match, once when Gunner was poked in the eye and once when he was clipped in the knee.
The Bro Mans matched up with the Beautiful People? Oh, no. this can’t end well.
#1 contenders match, Eric Young versus Bobby Roode!
I love Eric Young, but it’s freaking Bobby Roode. Bobby Roode! I expected a good match between the two, and the delivered. Fast paced, high impact, near falls, but Bobby won in the end.
The great part of this match? No swerve or heel turn for either guy.
Another X division six man match to crown a #1 contender for Samoa Joe. Didn’t they do this recently?
Homicide won the fast-paced match to become the new #1 contender, pinning Manic.
Post-match, Storm and Sanada come out and Sanada attacks and drags off Manic.
After the six man, Austin Aries is in the ring, calling out Storm and Sanada. (I know there was a commercial break, but why not have Austin come to the ring while Storm and Sanada were already there?) After some words back and forth, the action started, but Austin didn’t come alone, his help . . .
The Japanese Buzzsaw Tajiri!
This segment put over everyone involved and was a nice way to introduce Tajiri to TNA. The other thing that needs to be taking away from here is that Storm mentions that he now has Manic.
Rhino needed some butter and salt with his Spud as he ate the Rockstar Alive. The real story to take away from this match is EC3’s disconnect with the entire event and walking out on Spud as Spud reached out to EC3 after the match.
Now it is time for the Main Event. Bobby Lashley proved to Samoa Joe that he is the toughest man on the planet that has Kenny King running interference for him. ‘The King of the Night’ did one of the worst jobs of interfering in a match I have ever seen. He ran out, jumped on the top turnbuckle only to be knocked off by Joe BEFORE he could actually do anything.
The distraction did help Bobby get the spear and pin. Since this wasn’t about titles, what does Bobby get out of this, claiming himself as the toughest in the world?
FINAL THOUGHTS: Overall a good Impact, about on par with the last two weeks. That marks three good Impact broadcasts in a row! Shocking! Now, we just need to see if they can build on this and take it higher.
I like where EC3 is going, and I am intrigued by what James Storm is trying to do. Sanada and Manic, who next for Storm’s revolution.
RATING: 6
MATCH OF THE NIGHT: Bobby Roode versus Eric Young
WRESTLER OF THE NIGHT: Bobby Roode
IMPACT OF THE NIGHT: EC3 walking out on Spud after the Spud/Rhino match.
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