Adam J. Grammas of Westchester, Ill. (4.0): Best: Main event. Worst: Kaz's loss. In the opener, I thought the presence of Roode would have caused a distraction leading to Kaz's loss so as to protect him. I realize at this point they don't want Tomko to job to a "small" guy, but burying Kaz clean wasn't smart either. They should have faced different opponents. I think Mr. Caldwell's obvious dislike for TNA has clouded the facts for him-Tomko stopped Roode from berating Miss Brooks, not beating down Kaz. Tomko continues to flirt with a face turn, but saving Kaz would've been seen more as a full face turn than just stopping the abuse of Brooks. There seems to be a lot of "Are they face? Are they heel?" going on in TNA, but I'm guessing it's intentional, and not desperation. The AA thing was hokey, but I don't like Storm anyway. You knew Raven was going to be no match for Joe, so they should have used him against Kaz. I'm sure they don't want to remind people that Serotonin is no longer in existence. It's nice to see Lethal in with that group in the main event, but will TNA really let him be competition for Angle at the PPV? The only thing I'm guessing is some sort of interference so Lethal gets a major pin and we get the "secondary" belt off Angle. With the major announcement coming at the PPV (Impact expanding to two hours, I assume), they'll need the X Division title on an actual X Division wrestler so they can start using them again.
Terrie Neilson of Las Vegas, Nev. (7.5): Best: Storm segment; Mitchell promo; main event. Worst: Rhodes promo. For a go-home show, this one was sloppy and a little overdone, but some things stood out nicely. I like how they are handling the Miss Brooks issue. Tomko has been playing his part with a subtlety that most of the rest of the roster doesn't work from. He's at that place Batista was just before his complete face turn, knowing the score but hanging back till the right moment. They didn't quite pull the trigger on a face turn a while back, but he's in a good position to make the turn people will care about, as since his being blackmailed to stay heel he may have got something to help his case. He somewhat siding with Kaz over the Roode situation is a start, as Christian may question his loyalties after having partnered with Roode previously. Tenay and West blew it by talking about everything except what was happening in the ring, which would have helped put over the multiple dynamics even more. Sting did earn the other half of the tag titles, which people are already forgetting as the crowd seemed more focused on whether Sting is face or heel now. Angle keeping Karen out of the way to appease Sting (who obviously doesn't appreciate Karen's behavior) defuses Sting as true heel, which the crowd also wasn't noticing. Joe's beatdown served its purpose, but the commentators need to completely stop their assumptions that the home crowd who will hear them are smart fans. This tells me that TNA doesn't want an array of fans; they only want the smart ones as they won't have to preach to the already converted. That's an extreme insult to my intelligence. As for the PPV, while Angle doing triple duty on paper (though likely only doing double with Jones's current availablility) will be a curious thing to see, on the whole, it looks "eh." I see Angle keeping two of three after Sunday (Lethal's getting gold, Mitchell unleashes Judas on Abyss, and Angle & Sting get some kind of default win over Team Pacman). If the tag battle royal winners compete twice, they get the tag belts off Angle & Sting leading to a feud between them. Something needs to be addressed about Rhino on his entrance at the PPV; if his visual appearance doesn't explain his TV absence, there better be a good verbal one. The other matches are up in the air as to who I think will win (though I'm leaning toward the faces on all of them), but the one I care the least about is Reign-Harris.
Want your voice to be heard inside of WWE headquarters tomorrow morning? Or in TNA headquarters? This is the independent site many people in both groups read to gauge fan feedback. We still welcome your 1-10 score and comments. To contribute your thoughts on Raw, click here. Please keep your thoughts to around 10-15 lines if possible to increase your odds of being published.
PWTORCH FORMAT CONVENTIONS
For the sake of clarity to our readers (and to save us time editing these same things over and over), please follow these simple conventions when writing Torch Reax:
-Wrestlers teaming together should be connected with "&" symbol (e.g. Hunter & Michaels, Devon & Ray) or with a "/" (e.g. Animal/Hawk, Harris/Storm), but not dashes and not the word "and."
-To designate wrestlers who are fighting, feuding, or wrestling each other, put a dash (-) between them (e.g. Michaels-McMahon, Jarrett-Sting, Hogan-Andre) or use "vs."
-The word versus should always be abbreviated this way: "vs." with a period afterward (not "v." or "v/s" or "VS" or "VS." or any other way).
-Plus, it's just our policy, but we don't indulge wrestling promotions' strange spelling fetishes where they spell Raw, Smackdown, Heat, Impact, etc. with the haphazard capitalization of various leTTeRz. It seems very "junior high," so no Raw (it's Raw), no iMPACT (it's Impact), etc.
-Please try to avoid overuse of dot-dot-dots. If you have a thought that's "trailing off," you can use for effect, but otherwise, just use periods, commas, and our personal favorite, semicolons if you dare. We have always had a policy of only one exclamation point and no ALL CAPS. Let your words convey the meaning of your point. There's many to choose from out there.
INCREDIBLE BENEFITS! Over 50 full-length audio updates per month (iPod compatible)... New weekly award-winning Pro Wrestling Torch Newsletter (text and printable pdf versions) with latest exclusive insider news, new Torch Talks, great columns, Keller's cover story, much more... Hundreds of full-length back issues of PWTorch Newsletter from late-'80s to today... Ad-free access to PWTorch.com's Main Listing... VIP Forum with interaction with other subscribers and Torch staff... Torch Talk Library with text and audio of hundreds of interview installments from last 20 years... Great layout... Deepest archives on pro wrestling history anywhere... Keller's PWTorch Today PDF Bulletins with email alerts... VIP Email reports on major PPVs and TV shows... Staff Roundtable Reviews (text and audio) followiing major events... The best staff of writers and world class reporting since 1987... We'd love for you to join us and experience the most entertaining, authoritative, experienced staff of professional reporters and commentators in the business...
Compare the value of four or five months of PWTorch VIP content to the price of just one PPV. Can you cut 25 cents a day from your budget to make room for PWTorch VIP?
AND NEW FOR 2009! Monthly "Vintage Audio Torch Talks." We are releasing for the first time ever audio versions of our text Torch Talk updates, the historical first series of insider interviews ever. Wade Keller's newsmaking in-depth interviews with wrestling's biggest names are now being made available exclusively to VIP members. But you must be a member each month, as these are not archived, so they are replaced with a new one each month! This debuted in January 2009 with a 68 minute interview with the late "British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith. Who's next? Hulk Hogan? Eric Bischoff? The Rock? Goldberg? Jeff Hardy?
