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By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

IMPACT HITS

Opening Segment: Impact got off to a good start with Kurt Angle cutting a promo on Sting, Kevin Nash, and the mystery opponent. He was better than he’s been in weeks while playing to the crowd and making his points. Sting came out and had a nice, short promo giving Angle and the fans a big clue as to who his partner will be. Angle had some funny lines about having two college degrees and knowing how to crack a mystery because he watches shows like “CSI” and “24”. Kevin Nash was good in his role as well. The whole thing was entertaining, hyped the PPV Main Event, and set up the theme for the show of Angle trying to discover the partner’s identity. Unfortunately, his investigation would not live up to the strong start.

Robert Roode: Robert Roode has grown on me in recent weeks. His promo work has been very strong. He had one of the few good moments during Angle’s interrogations when he called into question Karen’s loyalty. He did not have much time to showcase his ability during the mixed tag match as the women got most of the ring time. But, he was strong afterwards in verbally berating Ms. Brooks. His brawl with Samoa Joe was good as well. If he can continue to deliver these promos, and continue to develop in the ring, he has a chance to be a top TNA heel.

Christian Cage: Christian had a solid week. His interview was very good. He asked some questions that many of us have been wanting to ask. It was particularly funny when he realized that Tomko and AJ Styles were nowhere to be found. His match with Chris Harris was not very good as it was very slow and never picked up steam. However, his post match attack with the ladder and the frog splash on Harris was very strong. I am curious to see where they are going with the repeated references to ladders.

Main Event: While it wasn’t great, Tomko & Styles vs. LAX for the Tag Team Championship was a good t.v. Main Event. There is an interesting parallel between the teams with a big power house teamed with an X-Division guy. There were some very good moves and fast-paced action. It was never boring and was clearly the best match of the night. It did suffer from the referee having no order in the match. For the most part, the guys came into the ring as they pleased. But it was still fun to watch, and had a very strong ending with Styles showing why he is “Phenomenal”. Things went downhill afterwards when the Latino Nation woman in disguise came out to help LAX, and then the Steiner Brothers showed up for no reason. But, none of that could sink in as TNA had to cut right away to the ninth appearance of Kurt Angle.

IMPACT MISSES

Storm vs. Kaz (and aftermath): This was too short to amount to much, and was the semifinals in a tournament to determine the #1 Contender for the World Championship. I blinked and it was over on a roll-up, the first of three roll-up finishes in five matches. Three in five matches? Come up with something different! Then, like last week, the outcome didn’t matter, as the loser got to drink beer. This beer buddy friendship between Eric Young and James Storm could be good under other circumstances, but not when it is more important than a title shot.

Angle Interrogations: It was unbelievable how often Angle was on this show. And while some of the scenes were funny, by far most of them were terrible. It is a huge waste of Jay Lethal’s talent to only have him on in one of these segments. I didn’t understand whether Chris Harris was reading his own complaints, or a list of other wrestlers’, but it wasn’t good. The whole scene with the Voodoo Kin Mafia should have been left on the cutting room floor. Angle crying about his father one moment, and then brutally hitting Young with a phonebook the next points to how schizophrenic this show is (and I’m doing my best to ignore Black Reign!). These segments took away from the rest of the show and really gave Impact the classic rushed 1 hour Impact feel that we were supposed to be done with now that the show as 2 hours.

Team 3D vs. X-Division: This segment started strong with Team 3D correctly pointing out how mindless the Impact Zone fans are when chanting “This is Awesome!” during an X-Division match. But then it got bad with Brother Ray’s tangent against the internet writers. Finally, the X-Division gets some revenge, but does it help? After all, it started with three guys jumping Team 3D from behind, and still getting their asses kicked. It wasn’t until about six others hit the ring that they were able to get the upper hand, and even then, the slow fat guys were easily able to slip away. This is not how to redeem the X-Division.

Women’s Division: The Women’s Division is as sorry as the X-Division. Christy Hemme is involved in a convoluted storyline with her team whom nobody cares about and nobody even knows anything about. Awesome Kong is running through every woman on the roster, in fact she’s the only one to get a win on Impact since the last PPV, yet she’s not one of the women getting a shot at Champion Gail Kim in the fatal 4-way at the PPV! They have done a good job introducing her, but none of the other women, and having two of them interrogated by Angle doesn’t count as character introduction. Who are these other women facing Kim at the PPV, and what did they do to earn that shot? Gail Kim is facing Ms. Brooks in a mixed tag match, but she has no reason to be. It was all so random, and none of it makes any sense.

Bad Investigation: Several months ago, Leticia was trying to find out the identity of a mystery partner. I think it was with Samoa Joe, but I don’t recall for sure. She was specifically trying to get that scoop, then she found out the identity, but never announced it. At the time I complained about it being bad journalism. This week, TNA did the same exact thing. Crystal was trying to find out Sting’s partner, then she found it out (at least who Eric Young claimed it was) and she never announced it. She said she was there to find out, then she did, but she didn’t do anything with that information. She is no better than Leticia at journalism.

Scott Hall “Reveal”: Why is TNA bringing Scott Hall back? Why do they live in the past? Why do they think the fans will care about him or believe that he will be Sting’s partner? Sting said his partner had world titles in WWE and WCW. Hall never won world titles in either organization. The fans who know Scott Hall to care about his reveal know he doesn’t fit in with the criteria. So it is a swerve that the fans will either not care about, or not buy into the premise.

Meaningless Tournament: This chase to the title tournament, or whatever TNA is calling it, is a total joke. First of all, it starts with a reverse battle royale, which is ridiculous to begin with, to determine the eight guys in the tournament. When two of them are taken out, instead of having a bye, two others are named, neither of whom were in the reverse battle royale, to replace them. One of them wins and is going to face Jr. Fatu in the semifinals. But he wasn’t there for unknown reasons. Instead of getting a bye, Christian has to face a mystery opponent. For some reason, the announcers knew that it was Matt Morgan who named Chris Harris as the opponent. How did they know it was Morgan, and since when does he have the power to make matches? The announcers said it was a good choice since Harris had been close to getting in the tournament, but he did fail to get in, so why is it a good choice? And who cares who wins this thing if a retired wrestler and Sting’s buddy can just show up and get title matches?

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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