Moore’s TNA Impact Wrestling Hit List: Drew Galloway vs. Jeff Hardy for the TNA Title, EC3 vs. The Matt Hardy Brand, Lashley and D’Angelo Dinero, Eddie Edwards and Shane Helms

By John Moore

TNA Impact Wrestling Hits

Opening Segment: Even though he’s not the TNA Champion anymore, Matt Hardy seems to be the person that TNA relies upon to carry the opening 10-15 minute promo segment, and he is doing as good of a job as he was as heel champ. This segment also allowed Mike Bennett to develop a bit as well. One highlight from the segment was the Maria and Reby Hardy confrontation where we got to see more of that random fire from her. Reby threatening to “put mah earing in yo face!” took me aback in a humorous way and Matt Hardy being the peacekeeper husband was sweet.

Matt Hardy, Tyrus, and Mike Bennett vs. EC3 and Beer Money: I’m going to combine both matches that lead up to this into one hit. Both were pretty good matches for what they were. Tyrus assisting Spud in a slow-mo corkscrew splash was awesome! The goal of the matches seemed to be keeping the Matt Hardy Brand strong while also moving Ethan Carter III to a feud with Mike Bennett. It also establishes that Hardy will cut off EC3 whenever he can. The best result from this was Hardy picking up the win after blocking the DWI after the Beer Money pose. Way better finish for Hardy than the loss or a DQ.

Lashley and D’Angelo Dinero: Lashley has been an unexpected surprise in his latest run as a heel and is doing some of his best character work of his career. I compare this to Batista’s renaissance in his first WWE run as a heel in that no one expected him to have the ability. Someone we did know who possessed the ability as a character is D’Angelo Dinero. He’s a below average cliché’ spitting color commentator and he says “Pope” too many times in the third person, but when you give him a microphone outside of the announce table, he can summon the fire of Dusty Rhodes and sell a feud better than anyone. It seems like this feud is established to give Lashley someone to destroy, but it can be a good feud to help transition Dinero into being a wrester again. TNA could use him given the departures of Eric Young and Bobby Roode. Plus, Lashley and Pope can both be elevated from this feud if TNA can pull it off right.

BroMans vs. Eric Young and Bram: This can as easily be a Miss as it is a Hit. I’ll settle with the minor Hit for the outcome and the fact that Jessie Godderz looked good in his hot tag moment. At the same time, TNA could use any additional tag teams they can get in the division with the “Tag Title Curse” continuing with Beer Money’s time running out (because of Bobby Roode and Young leaving). TNA essentially lost two tag teams with The Wolves already being shelved due to Davey Richards’ injury. The problem with BroMans was evident here and last week, they can’t get a reaction. Robbie tries to pause for the pops at the right moment, but the crowd doesn’t know how to react. It’s BroMans! I don’t think they have the nostalgic value that TNA thinks they have. If they were going to do anything with BroMans, then perhaps they should give them a name and gimmick overhaul. Maybe it’s time to have Billy Corgan work his magic just like he did with Crazzy Steve and Decay.

Al Snow and Grado: This is a feud I can get down with and I like how they are starting at the beginning this time. When Grado was introduced, they started at chapter seven of an Al Snow feud that started on a British TNA show that people in the United States can’t watch and were thus late to the party for. The backstage beatdown here of Mahabali Shera and Grado was a good reset button on the feud that we didn’t get to see. Grado was really good in his cries of agony and that could only make him more sympathetic. The last time we saw Al Snow in the ring he looked like Dustin Rhodes in that he was in better shape later in his career than he was in his younger years, so Snow won’t look out of place in a modern day feud.

Eddie Edwards and Shane Helms: While it might be a bit scary that Trevor Lee looks like he’s being buried in the background, but I feel like he’s just looming in the wings for a bigger and pretty obvious picture. It seems obvious that Helms is going to screw Eddie Edwards over on his guaranteed title shot in favor of putting Lee over somehow, in the same way he pulled the bait and switch on Tigre Uno. This might be a really intelligent move in trying to move the former ROH World Champion Eddie Edwards over to the X Division and the fact that we didn’t get a pointless triple threat involving Uno, Zema Ion, and/or Mark Andrews is a good sign that Helms is putting in a serious effort this time to help elevate the X Division.

Drew Galloway vs. Jeff Hardy: A really good world championship match between two main eventerst. When Hardy returned, I feared we might get a Rey Mysterio post 2011 run from him in how the leg injuries made Rey a shell of what he used to be. Hardy is a great magician at his “high risk” style and even if he is taking a safer route (which I really hope he is) he’s good at hiding it. An example of that was the Swanton to the steel steps which was similar to his annual UK injury from 2015 where he uses a judo roll technique to mitigate the impact from a high point (and extra points to Drew Galloway for guiding him correctly with his legs). The one thing I would have changed was the placement of the Claymore Kick and Swanton kickouts, as they didn’t build the drama that they wanted to by that point, but that’s just nitpicking. The Future Shock DDT being built up as the definitive Galloway finisher is a solid move as well.

TNA Impact Wrestling Misses

Ethan Carter III: At least he seems in the correct position as a babyface which is below Drew Galloway, but I can’t help but feel that they could be doing a better good job developing EC3 as a top babyface. He’s trying to be a B-Movie action hero, which almost makes it seem like he’s just Derrick Bateman with a main event push. Derrick Bateman was funny, but he wasn’t main event. Ethan Carter III had a clever edge to him and that edge has been suppressed in his current face run. Maybe if he can draw from anyone, he should try to mimic what Ken Anderson did in his 2015 run where he had tongue-in-cheek lines while also showing the heart and aggression to overshadow the comedy.

Velvet Sky vs. Madison Rayne: The match was actually pretty decent, especially compared to the Dollhouse train wreck we got last week. The Miss comes in the form of the purpose of this match. Gail Kim’s counter to Maria ducking out again was setting up a match with the Beautiful People? Huh? Logic please.