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Arena Reports
2/23 TNA in Elmira, N.Y.: Kong vs. Gail Kim vs. Jackie, Angle vs. Christian, Storm vs. Young Feb 24, 2008 - 3:01:48 PM
TNA house show report
February 23, 3008
Elmira, N.Y.
Report by Jim Bennett, PWTorch correspondent
(1) LAX defeated the Rock and Rave Infection ( minus Christy Hemme ) when Homicide hit Rave with the top rope Diamond Cutter. LAX got over early when Hernandez went over the top rope with a tope to hit Lance Hoyt.
(2) Jay Lethal retained the X-Division title with a win over Sonjay Dutt. Good back and forth action with Lethal ending it with the top rope elbow smash. Afterwards he led the crowd in an "Oh Yeah"
(3) James Storm (with Jacqueline) defeated Eric Young. Comedy Match. Spots included Eric taking the refs shit off of Hebner and wearing it himself, giving Hebner to chance to tangle with Storm. Eventually Hebner and Eric teamed up to beat on Storm a bit. Eventually Jackie interfered and got on Eric's shoulders which allowed Storm to hit the superkick for the win.
(4) Team 3D defeated The Motor City Machine Guns in a New York Street Fight, when Bubba hit the Bubba Bomb through a table on Shelley. Team 3d was announced has having a combined weight of 485 (which was weird) and they were totally the faces here. Bubba talked about the Machine Guns were from Detroit and that they were from New York and glad to be home ( even though Elmira is 5 hours from NYC ) Lots of chants for tables throughout the match, which they got. Team 3d hit the 3d on Sabin allowing them to get Shelley up for the Bubba bomb. After the match they brought a young kid in and signed and gave him a big part of the table.
(5) Samoa Joe defeated A.J. Styles with the Coquina Clutch. A.J. had most of the offense in this match, hitting most of his spots minus the Styles Clash. Joe really didn't do much in the match, teasing the muscle buster a few times, until catching Styles with the Clutch.
(6) Awesome Kong retained the Knockouts title with a win over Gail Kim and Jacqueline. A local radio morning man did the intros to the match, saying it was a battle between 3 of the hottest women we would ever see. Obviously he had never seen Kong. Kong got the pinfall after delivering the powerbomb to Jacqueline.
(7) Kurt Angle retained the TNA Heavyweight Title with a win over Christian Cage. Good back and forth action with both guys teasing their finishers several times until Christian hit the Unprettier. Angle was able to recover to hit the Olympic Slam followed by the lay down Ankle lock.
NOTES: WWE ran here in early January and packed the place with approximately 4,000 people. I would estimate there were 1,500-2,000 at last nights show, not bad for a first time running a smaller town like Elmira.
After the show they did the in-ring photos with Kurt Angle and probably half the place got in line to participate, they made some nice dough on the side on that deal.
Overall it was a fun show, hopefully next time they can bring a little bit bigger crew as the show only ran about 2 hours. Plus maybe they could open it up just a bit more on the offense. In my opinion, TNA is not big enough to get people to come just to see the "stars", they've gotta have their guys giving it up in the ring.
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