The TNA iMPACT Verdict: January 7 2006
Team 3D vs Lex Lovett & Buck Quartermain
Homicide & Appolo w/ Konnan vs The Naturals
Ron Killings vs. Bobby Roode
Alex Shelley & Austin Aries & Roderick Strong vs. A.J. Styles & Chris Sabin & Christopher Daniels
“This is TNA .. the new face of professional wrestling!” is followed by a video montage of the 3/4 Live Kru saga, lead off by and featuring Bob Armstrong. Now that’s quality irony.
Team 3D vs Lex Lovett & Buck Quartermain
Team 3D ambush them before the bell for a beatdown. Squash match.
Bubba Ray says that he’d give up all 18 title reigns he’s had before in order to hold the TNA titles once. Devon tries to say something, but his mic isn’t on and he doesn’t realize, so he yells something into the mic and then poses. Couldn’t that have been dubbed in during post production?
Winner: Team 3D via pinfall.
Backstage, Shane Douglas busts into the Jarrett camp locker room, trying to interview AMW, but Jarrett pulls him aside to rant about Sting being brought in. Jarret says that they’ll do a tribute to Sting. Then Scott D’amore arrives, with a letter from Jackie Gayda, and says that he’s read it already, so perhaps Jarrett has some explaining to do. JJ claims that women blow things out of proportion, which pisses Gail off, so JJ calls for everyone to get ready for the Sting Tribute and then leaves the locker room.
Homicide & Appolo w/ Konnan vs The Naturals
Konnan calls the “Latin American Exchange” the “new force in town.”
Match starts off with a brawl, then for no reason Konnan hops into the ring, knocks the ref out, and hits both members of The Naturals with a sock filled with quarters. The beatdown continues until Kip and BG James hit the ring, BG gets beat down until Kip clears the ring with a chair. You know, they could have had an actual match here and /then/ had a run-in, but no.
Winner: Naturals via DQ.
Throughout the show they’re airing clips of different TNA wrestlers talking about Sting and their favourite memory of him.
Backstage, Larry Z and Jackie Gayda are arguing about something with Shane Douglas watches, while Austin Aries, Roderick Strong, and Alex Shelley jump in and bitch at Larry Z that they don’t get enough attention. Jerry Lynn shows up and tells them to worry about their next match, and maybe they’ll do better if they do some winning. This was totally written for the smarks.
Ron Killings vs. Bobby Roode
Ron wins with a rollup in mere seconds. Roode demands an instant rematch, which Ron accepts. Roode gets in a few stomps, D’amore tries to throw in a hockey stick, and Ron gets a second rollup pin. D’amore calls it “the cheapest crap he’s ever seen” and calls for a third match. If this was a best of three, Truth would have already won!
So the third match starts with Truth chasing D’amore around the ring. Roode lies in wait, hits a clothesline outside the ring, and then takes him back inside. Straight to a chinlock! Truth takes control and hits a powerslam for two. D’amore once again comes in with a hockey stick, and Truth hits him and sets up for the scissors kick, but Roode hits a clotheslines and gets the three count, and that’s that. I’m not sure why Killings didn’t call for a /fourth/ match after that …
Winner: I don’t know. Two falls to Truth, one fall to Roode, Roode wins final fall.
I’m not sitting here with a stopwatch, but we’ve had three matches in the first thirty minutes, and I don’t think any of them have gone longer than three minutes.
As a side note, Ron’s on screen name appears simply as “Truth,” and that’s all that Roode called him, also.
Backstage, Shane interviews Samoa Joe, who says it doesn’t matter what he thinks about Christopher Daniels, but what Daniels thinks of Joe — the man who put him in the hospital for a month, the man who made him unable to hold his baby son. Joe says he’s bringing a new towel, a fresh canvas to the PPV, and he’ll paint it with Daniel’s blood. Shane asks Joe what he thinks about sting, and Joe simply walks off.
Alex Shelley & Austin Aries & Roderick Strong vs. A.J. Styles & Chris Sabin & Christopher Daniels
Mighty fine 6 man match that I don’t type fast enough to do PBP on. The new heel faction gets the win after Shelley pinned Sabin.
Winner: Shelley/Aries/Strong via pinfall.
Jarret Camp’s Tribute to Sting
Crowd is pissing on this from the moment it starts. Eric Young comes out dressed as early 90s Sting, all in pink, doing the traditional poses. Chris Harris comes as 1996 crow sting. For some reason he’s followed by someone dressed as a chicken, or, as Jarrett calls him, a crow. We fast forward to 2006, and Monty Brown comes out with white face paint on, a golf visor, and preppy clothes. He’s also pushing a baby stroller, featuring a baby wearing a crow mask. Monty does a few exercises before making his way into the ring. “The Stinger of 2006, that’s how we stroll.” Okay, that was a funny line, and it brings out Christian Cage. Team 3D joins him, and they all hit the ring. They clear the ring down to the chicken, and after a pause, toss it outside too.
Abyss then hits the ring and lays all three of them out, so Rhino joins the fray and hits a Gore!Gore!Gore! to close the show.
The Jury’s Verdict: The X Division match was the only match worth watching, and the final stuff was typical “Throw out everyone and have them brawl” TNA booking, although Monty Brown seemed decently funny in his role. However, a few bright spots aren’t enough to save this show. If you want to watch on Monday, tune in at half-past the hour to see the X Division match, and give up after that. TNA’s insistence on throwing out 4 matches — even if one, two, or even three of them are complete throwaways — shows that they’re not interested in re-examining their formula and trying to tweak it.
The things I enjoy about TNA still outweigh the things I don’t, but they sure as hell don’t outnumber them!
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