Impact Wrestling Review
June 28, 2016
By: Josh Boutwell of Wrestleview.com
An excellent Main Event capped off a jam packed Impact tonight filled with a ton of newsworthy moments in TNA land as well as some pretty solid action.
The opening segment with Bennett, EC3, Galloway, and Lashley was really great as it set up the future Option C cash in as well as both the Main Event and X-Division Title Match tonight. It also planted the seeds of dissention between EC3 and Galloway guaranteeing they wouldn’t be able to work together to take Lashley out in the Main Event.
I despise the fact that Bennett has been trashing the X-Division and the title since winning it but at the same time he is a dickhead heel and I am supposed to feel that way about him so job well done. If no one beats him for the title, and he cashes it in for the World Title shot, it will really make everyone in the division look silly and pretty much bury the entire division so I’m really hoping that they pull something out next week. Battle Royals are beyond pointless for the X-Division. You hamper them from doing many big spots or dives in the match which is the calling card of the division. I hate Battle Royals most of the time anyone but it makes it worse with the X-Division. They could have just done a “Scramble Match” or Elimination Match instead which would have been so much better.
Sutter winning was simply done to give Bennett a bit more heat and he always doesn’t look bad because he was beaten down before the match even started (after already having won a Battle Royal). When you have so many other great (and young) guys in that X-Division it really doesn’t make much sense trying to push Sutter. I don’t dislike the guy I just don’t see him as something I would want to build the X-Division around. Honestly he needs to be paired with someone in a tag team, I could see him really becoming a nice addition to the roster in that way. As long as he is able to find someone he has chemistry with.
I don’t think I’ve ever actually liked one of those “Fact of Life” segments that Eli Drake has done but I really enjoyed this weeks. The guy is charismatic and hilarious and Storm can be both as well so they were able to play off of each other. They are both pretty good in the ring so a feud between those two will be welcomed. Especially since Storm has just been spinning his wheels ever since Roode left.
Gail and Sienna was way too short for them to have really done anything worthwhile in the match other than give Sienna a win over a quality opponent. I’m still unsure where they are going with all of this other than Jade and Marti feuding. Why does Sienna need to feud with Gail after this? She already beat her (unless they just go with the Maria trying to take her out).
The Hardyz stuff was really bad and I don’t want to speculate about stuff like this but Jeff really seemed to be slurring his words in his promo. Hopefully I’m wrong and just looking too much into it but it definitely seemed that way. It sounds like they are going with an Empty Arena thing for the “Final Battle” but I get a feeling we are going to get more overly dramatic stuff like they did with the “Brother Nero” angle before Slammiversary. It will definitely pique the interest of the internet regardless I’m sure.
The Main Event was really great with all three guys working hard. They keep teasing possibly doing a babyface vs. babyface thing with Drew and EC3 (or maybe turning one of them though I think that may be too soon for either) and if the intensity they showed in this match is any indication of what that feud would be it should be insane. Galloway legit broke open EC3’s skin with those nasty chops that would make any Japanese fan blush. Lashley played off of the distention between the babyfaces perfectly and used their one-upmanship against them to eventually get the win. Great physicality, great intensity, crisp moves, good storytelling. Just a really good Main Event.
I want to take a second here to rant about one of the biggest cancers in the history of wrestling before I go. I’m sure most people have either heard, or heard about, the comments Vince Russo made on his pathetic podcast this week. If you haven’t heard he blatantly admitted to going behind TNA’s backs when they got the deal with both Destination America and POP and tried to get the TV networks to hire him as a “consultant.” His reasoning was that those networks “don’t know how to produce a wrestling show” and that he was the reason that TNA managed to get over a million viewers on Spike and that only he could help them get back to that. He claimed to be only trying to help TNA and wrestling by doing this and that he actually told POP’s president that TNA had “sold him on a bill of goods” in regards to the ratings. He then went on to admit to trying to get Lucha Underground to make him a “consultant” for them too. Thankfully no one was stupid enough to hire this guy again but all of this really just sums up the type of scumbag this guy is. He’s only out for himself and even tries to play like the hero trying to save TNA as he went behind TNA’s back and undermined them to their TV network and even attempted to gain some measure of control over the product without their knowledge. I have to lay the blame of this partly at Dixie Carter’s feet because it was her that continuously gave this piece of trash chance after chance after chance over the last decade or so, even going as far as to hide his involvement with the company because of the hatred that many fans had for him and his stupid ideas. Vince Russo is a massive, zit on the ass of the wrestling business, but as long as people continue to actually give this man their money (I’m serious people pay to listen to this man talk) or their time that zit will just get bigger and bigger. Hopefully this is the wake up call that everyone in the wrestling business needs to realize that no one should ever want that man anywhere near their wrestling company ever, ever again.
– Promo/Segment of the Night: Opening
– Match of the Night: Lashley vs. Drew vs. EC3 (***)
– Overall Grade: C+