By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

IMPACT HITS

Christian Coalition: Once again, Christian Cage and his cronies were the highlight of Impact. The show got off to a good start with them arriving at the Impact Zone. It was pretty amusing that they couldn’t remember Matt Morgan’s name. Christian was good later in the show when he called out Morgan. He might not have a lot to work with, but he always delivers well with what he has. I liked that after Morgan named himself the special enforcer for the Cage vs. Samoa Joe Bound For Glory rematch, Christian questioned how he had that power. Then Jim Cornette made it official. It was a nice touch of logic that we don’t see enough on this show.

Christopher Daniels vs. Jay Lethal: This was a good 5 minute match with a head scratching ending (more later). But the match itself was fun to watch while it lasted. It would have been nice if it had been longer, but it should be good enough to make fans want to see more of it at a PPV. There is no doubt that Daniels and Lethal are two of the most talented guys on the TNA roster. It is not surprising that they can have a good match together. They have great athleticism and are both capable of hitting some amazing moves. There was nothing that special here, or particularly memorable. But it was fun to watch which is the important thing. And as I said, it makes me want to see more so it gets a Hit.

IMPACT MISSES

Handcuffs: There is a lot I can complain about in regards to the Karen Angle, Sting and Kurt Angle confrontation. I could complain about how ridiculous it is that Kurt still thinks that Sting slapped Karen (watch a replay already!). I could complain about the lack of logic in Kurt’s plan to ambush Sting. When Karen announced her husband, Sting came out instead, and Kurt was ready behind him to ambush him. How did they know Sting would come out? And if he hadn’t, would Kurt have eventually come out himself? I could complain about those things, but I won’t. Instead I will complain about TNA’s repeated use of handcuffs. Somebody seems to get handcuffed to the ropes every single PPV and every other week on Impact. Last week it was Samoa Joe getting handcuffed by Christian. At the PPV there were handcuffs during Black Reign vs. Chris Harris. And this week Sting gets handcuffed by Angle. Enough already! Give it a rest for a few months please. Note: this Miss has nothing to do with only having one hour.

“Schizophrenic”: There is a lot I can complain about Black Reign, but unlike the last Miss, I won’t list them. I will focus on the name of his finisher, Schizophrenic. That is an appropriate name for the move. But the problem with it is that the announcers didn’t come up with the name. They specifically said that it is what Black Reign calls his move. It would make sense if they gave it that nick name. But why would Black Reign call his move Schizophrenic? Does he realize that he is schizophrenic? They are playing up the split personality and actually doing a decent job of it (although it might be better with a few more appearances of Dustin Rhodes), but it makes no sense that Rhodes would be conscious of his split personality that he would name his finisher after his mental affliction. I guess it is a minor point, but it really bothered me as being illogical. Note: this Miss has nothing to do with only having one hour.

Lethal Loses: After getting the biggest win in his career over Kurt Angle at the PPV, Jay Lethal’s career has gone downhill very fast. First he was treated like a jobber later in the PPV. Now he lost clean to Christopher Daniels. Presumably this is setting up a feud and a title match at Bound For Glory, but there are other ways to go that wouldn’t make the X-Divsision Champion look bad. TNA gets heat for having too many watered down endings in order to protect both guys, but this is a case where interference costing Lethal the match would make perfect sense. Or have it be in a tag match. Or have him win his first match as Champion against Elix Skipper and have Daniels attack him afterwards. But don’t make the Champion look bad on his first show after winning the title. Note: this has nothing to do with only having one hour.

Bound For Glory Line Up: Was I the only one confused when Cornette rattled off a list of matches for Bound For Glory? I remember him naming three matches and I have issues with all of them. The first was a reverse Battle Royale to name a #1 contender or something. I remember the first time they did this match and hearing that there will be a second does not make me want to buy the PPV. Then he announced a ten Woman gauntlet match with five unknown TNA knockouts. Have fans been hoping for a women’s division in TNA? Then he announced an Ultimate X match between Triple X (which two? Or all three?) vs. LAX in a match between two teams with no storyline or feud. That was so random. Where did that match come from? Note: this Miss does have to do with having only one hour as maybe (I empasize “maybe”) TNA will have a better chance at developing storylines with two hours and won’t have to have Cornette quickly list a series of matches for the next PPV as a substitute for plot development.

Abyss vs. Angle: There were so many problems with this match. For one thing, if you are going to give away a Cage Submission match on free t.v., at least announce it a week ahead of time. And as a Submission match, there are no disqualifications, so why did Abyss have to break his Boston Crab when Angle got to the ropes? And why would the referee try to stop the wrestlers from using a steel chair? And a week away from the concussion story about Chris Benoit, did we need to see stiff chair shots to Abyss’ head? The match itself was rather dull. Judas Mecias had a decent introduction, but it was beyond predictable. He had a good look with the weird blood liquid in his mouth and the white contact lenses, but then he was wearing traditional wrestling tights which somehow didn’t fit the image. His beat down on Abyss was bloody but didn’t mean anything since we’ve seen two Impacts this year that have ended with a similarly bloody Abyss. This was a mess.

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's Hitlist Specialist, providing his point of view in the Torch's hitlist format for Raw, Smackdown, ECW, and TNA Impact each week. Email him at jmezz-torch@sbcglobal.net.

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