{"id":46137,"date":"2017-08-11T17:36:06","date_gmt":"2017-08-11T22:36:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/?p=46137"},"modified":"2017-08-11T17:36:06","modified_gmt":"2017-08-11T22:36:06","slug":"gfw-impact-hits-misses-gail-kim-sydal-joseph-park-lashley-davey-richards-lax-tyrus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2017\/08\/11\/gfw-impact-hits-misses-gail-kim-sydal-joseph-park-lashley-davey-richards-lax-tyrus\/","title":{"rendered":"GFW IMPACT HITS &#038; MISSES: Gail Kim, Sydal, Joseph Park, Lashley, Davey Richards, LAX, Tyrus"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"pwtor-1687176567\" class=\"pwtor-before-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><hr \/><b>SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)... <\/b>\r\n\r\n<iframe src=\"https:\/\/widget.spreaker.com\/player?show_id=3076978&theme=light&playlist=false&playlist-continuous=false&autoplay=false&live-autoplay=false&chapters-image=true&episode_image_position=right&hide-logo=false&hide-likes=false&hide-comments=false&hide-sharing=false&hide-download=true\" width=\"100%\" height=\"140px\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe>\r\n<hr \/><\/div><h3>HITS<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Park&#8217;s Delivery:<\/strong> Joseph Park has been dispensing sage advice to Grado about life and women these past few weeks. On Impact, he relayed a quote from a man he knew that sounded inspirational but there was no conclusion to the story. \u201cWhy didn\u2019t you ask him?&#8221; Grado asked. \u201cHe died a couple years ago,\u201d Park responded before walking off. Can\u2019t help it. The line and his delivery got me.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Kim\u2019s Return:<\/strong> Having Gail Kim back on TV immediately makes the struggling Knockouts Division feel more important. I\u2019m curious to see how her last few months on TV will play out and if she\u2019ll end up retiring with the title. It would be great if they had a few more weeks to build Kim\/Sienna, but perhaps they have something planned storyline-wise where it will all make sense.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Lashley and Sydal\u2019s Interview:<\/strong> I\u2019ve been rough on Matt Sydal here lately. However, last night he was in a solid segment with Bobby Lashley. Maybe these backstage promos play more to his strength. While the announcers built up that Sydal has little chance to win in his upcoming match, it\u2019s great to see his character show no fear of his much larger opponent. Also, Lashley straight up choking Sydal instead of throwing him into the wall or giving him a wrestling move made the segment feel a lot more realistic. Good stuff all around.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Super X Cup Semi Final:<\/strong> While not as strong as Drago vs. Dezmond Xavier from last week, ACH and Taiji Ishimori put on a strong bout. And while the two went 10 minutes (which is much longer than X Division matches used to go), I was hoping for another five to really amp up the drama over who is going to make it to the finals. Hopefully they give Xavier and Ishimori enough time to create a classic that will make the Super X Cup something to look forward to every year.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Main Event:<\/strong> It was nice to see some fresh blood in the main event. Trevor Lee, Low Ki, Sonjay Dutt, and Matt Sydal all had the spotlight on them, and everyone worked well together to put on an entertaining match. Great to see the heels going over too, as El Patron has been booked so dominant that Low Ki needed a win to make his upcoming title shot credible.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Overall Show:<\/strong> The best episode of Impact in well over a month. The company has put on some real duds lately, yet this edition largely delivered. They focused on the in-ring action and cut down on the campy comedy, which made the entire show more entertaining to watch. Sadly, I have no faith that this trend will continue on a weekly basis. Of course, I\u2019m hoping I\u2019m wrong.<\/p>\n<h3>MISSES<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Davey\u2019s End:<\/strong> I held off on this miss, as I hadn\u2019t read the spoilers and didn\u2019t know if Davey Richards would be written off the show before the next set up tapings. It didn\u2019t happen. For casual fans who don\u2019t read wrestling websites, Richards is just gone without any explanation. Once again, absolutely no other TV show (besides Raw and Smackdown) could get away with this. He was a big part of Impact for the past few years and didn\u2019t receive a storyline exit, nor was he even mentioned by the announcers. Yes, he announced his retirement after the tapings, but they could have offered him enough money to say, put over Eddie Edwards in a loser must retire match. Hey, when Mr. Hooper died in real life on Sesame Street, they said goodbye to the character in a storyline! Let people know that Richards (while still very much alive) isn\u2019t returning.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Garza\u2019s Pants:<\/strong> No babyface should stop what they\u2019re doing mid-match, and make their opponents stand there like idiots while they tear off their own pants. It\u2019s a total heel spot but Garza Jr. busts it out every time he wrestles. Once again, it backfired on him on Impact. Serves him right. Here\u2019s a thought: how about either keep your pants or take them off before going into hand-to-hand combat?<\/p><div id=\"pwtor-700889199\" class=\"pwtor-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<p><strong>LAX Keeps Looking Weak:<\/strong> It was great to see Low Ki get a little momentum heading into his World Title match. Unfortunately, once again the rest of the group looked like scrubs. It took five people to take down the painfully bland Veterans of War. It\u2019s hard to take Jeremy Borash\u2019s claim that LAX is the most dangerous stable in the company\u2019s history when they\u2019re booked to get thoroughly massacred on a near weekly basis.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What\u2019s The Deal With Tyrus?:<\/strong> Yes, I\u2019m using an old Seinfeld phrase for this entry, but seriously, what is the deal with Tyrus? Over the past year or so he had months worth of vignettes, then showed up on TV, then disappeared again, then showed up with Eli Drake, then they broke up, then they got back together, then he left to join Bruce Prichard, now he wants to face Kongo Kong for some reason. Maybe this will make sense. It\u2019s much more likely it will not.<\/p>\n<div class=\"pwtor-end-article-groups pwtor-entity-placement\" id=\"pwtor-1925751689\"><div id=\"pwtor-673824427\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\nTHANK YOU FOR VISITING<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>HITS Park&#8217;s Delivery: Joseph Park has been dispensing sage advice to Grado about life and women these past few weeks. On Impact, he relayed a quote from a man he knew that sounded inspirational but <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2017\/08\/11\/gfw-impact-hits-misses-gail-kim-sydal-joseph-park-lashley-davey-richards-lax-tyrus\/\" title=\"GFW IMPACT HITS &#038; MISSES: Gail Kim, Sydal, Joseph Park, Lashley, Davey Richards, LAX, Tyrus\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44952,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,28,27],"tags":[175,1628,461,5657,5331,4895,368,1749],"class_list":["post-46137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opnionandanalysis","category-specialists_hitsandmisses","category-specialists","tag-bobby-lashley","tag-davey-richards","tag-gail-kim","tag-hector-garza","tag-joseph-park","tag-lax","tag-matt-sydal","tag-tyrus"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/post\/2017\/07\/GFW_Impact_Logo_2017_3x2_600.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46137"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46138,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46137\/revisions\/46138"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}