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By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

IMPACT HITS

ODB vs. Angelina Love: This was a good (but short) Knockout match. In only lasted about 3 minutes, but it was good action for those 3 minutes. It is nice to see a match between two women who can actually wrestle and are not just 100% eye candy. TNA is trying to build ODB, who is getting very good reactions from the fans, so a squash victory here makes perfect sense. Despite what I said about the quality of their ability, the skank meter is still off the charts in this match, which is unfortunate. The fans aren’t reacting to ODB because she is a good wrestler. They are responding to the lowest common denominator in the way that she presents herself. Don West even told the fans that ODB stands for One Dirty Bitch, which previously had only been said at a PPV. It is unfortunate that TNA feels the need to shankify their women, because these two showed that even in a short match, they can perform very well.

Senshi vs. Kaz: This was a good (but short) X-Division match. I am confused as to the status of Senshi if he was let out of his contract like two months ago. And while he has lost every match since then, he has at least performed well in the ring. He and Kaz put on a high energy and fun match. Unfortunately, as per TNA’s rules, the match only went 4 minutes. Again, it was a good 4 minutes, so I am giving it a Hit. But with the exception of the Main Event, the matches on Impact were just too short to amount to anything special. How is that an alternative to WWE?

Main Event: The Main Event was good, but not great. I was expecting great, so I am disappointed. However, I will take a good long Main Event every week if TNA will give it to us. I will get the negatives out of the way first. The elimination of Samoa Joe was just cheesy and seemed incongruent with so many instances in TNA’s past when the referees have ignored the rules. The other negative is that none of the wrestlers stood out as being one to cheer for. Samoa Joe is the only babyface in the group, and he hasn’t been booked as someone to get behind lately. The Impact Zone fans who have been traditionally huge Joe supporters (“Joe Is Gonna Kill You”) seemed to be more split between Christian Cage and AJ Styles. He didn’t get a great reaction, all because of how he has been booked. Then, he was the first to go. TNA hasn’t done a good job of getting the fans emotionally involved in this match, so there was very little drama in it. All three wrestlers involved worked hard to put on a good match. It had very good action. I liked the fact that it was an elimination match, not just a one fall that we’ve seen way too often in triple threat matches. The idea that Joe would not break up a submission move played perfectly into the stipulation of the match. There is nothing to complain about in terms of the action. But, I want to cheer for someone. In this case, I was only cheering for not-Styles, because I really didn’t want to see three weeks of him trying to decide whether to face Kurt Angle, or give him two months off. In that respect, I am happy Christian won, but I am not emotionally involved in seeing Christian vs. Angle again.

IMPACT MISSES

Shark Tank: Is TNA just begging for someone to say that they Jumped the Shark with these terrible terrible terrible segments? I have said it multiple times, but I just don’t care about Shark Boy, and these scenes from his supposed home did nothing to make me change my mind. He is a jobber. Why is so much time dedicated to him? Couldn’t 1 minute of action been added to each under card match by getting rid of these stupid, lame, bad pun-infested scenes? LAX seems to be demoted to doing a Cryme Tyme gimmick, which is a shame considering their in ring talent, and credibility. It seems like that is the last time we will get to hear Chris Harris complaining about his lack of a push, and that is the only positive here. It boggles my mind that something so bad could get so much air time.

“Knockout” Title: This isn’t a 1-17-08 Impact Miss, but a TNA Miss. It goes along with what I said above in regards to the women wrestlers in TNA. I understand that the term “Knockout” was brought in as a way of labeling the women the way that WWE labels their women as “Divas.” But, that was when they were just eye candy, before they actually built a talented roster of women wrestlers. The term is demeaning to the real wrestlers, because it is only pointing out their looks. I don’t mind them calling the women Knockouts as a marketing ploy. The real problems is calling the Women’s Championship the Knockout’s Championship. At least the WWE doesn’t call it the Divas’ Championship. Give the women some respect and call the title the Women’s Championship.

Secret Revealed: Raise your hand if you didn’t know that James Mitchell was Abyss’ father? Since I don’t see any hands raised, I will conclude that everyone saw that secret coming. It was very anticlimactic, and since I never cared about the secret or storyline in the first place, I certainly didn’t care about hearing the secret revealed. I would have preferred hearing something less predictable, because at least that would have given me something to talk about. “Hey, TNA did something unpredictable! That’s pretty cool!” Instead, it is more like, “hey, TNA did the lame reveal that I expected them to. Who cares?”

Partner Revealed: After weeks of “build up” to BG James announcing who his partner will be when he finally gets to case in Feast or Fired, “build up” that included him telling Kip James that he was scouting someone, he finally revealed his partner to be ... his dad, Bullet Bob Armstrong! And that is the sound of 1.6 million people not caring. Even TNA had to know that this was a stupid idea, since they only gave it about a minute of air time.

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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