By Jason Powell, Prowrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
Impact Wrestling Hits
Austin Aries vs. Matt Sydal: It may seem trivial, but Aries did a better job of explaining Austin’s Option C choice from back in the day than I remember anyone doing since that initial storyline. He managed to establish in just a few seconds that it wasn’t demeaning to the X Division Championship but was instead about opportunity. Meanwhile, this segment effectively established the show’s main event right off the top of the show. There was also so fun comedy with Josh Mathews fretting over Sydal agreeing to put over the Grand Championship on the line just a couple weeks after Sydal gave the title to Mathews. The actual match was good and had seemingly high stakes, though it’s still impossible to care about the worthless Grand Championship. It’s also hard to believe Sydal is a credible threat to the company’s top championship despite his in-ring ability. His new character currently feels mid-card quirky and I’m not sure if they will be able to change that.
Eddie Edwards attacks OVE at an independent event: This was much better use of the company’s independent footage than the usual random match approach. It was timely given the ongoing storyline between Edwards and Sami Callihan. It also kept the intensity of the feud strong and wisely left Edwards in a sympathetic position. The independent crowd chanting along with Callihan and OVE had a dark, cult-like feel to it. In other words, the OVE name was finally good for something.
Brian Cage vs. Lashley: A minor Hit for good torch passing match between the two monsters of Impact. Unfortunately, the crowd was flat and thus the atmosphere was lousy. This just didn’t feel as big as it should have. The live crowd was only part of the problem, as it felt like this should have been a match that the company built up to throughout the show instead of just having it occur in the middle of the broadcast. I get that the company also had a title vs. title match on this show, but why not put these matches on separate shows since they both felt main event worthy? That said, I applaud Impact for finally using one of their departing talents to put over one of their new mainstays.
Su Yung vs. Amber Nova: A good showcase win for the Yung. I’m still not sold on Braxton Sutter’s involvement in the Knockouts Division or with this character, but we’ll see where it goes.
Impact Wrestling Misses
KM vs. Fallah Bahh: I was hoping that Impact scrapped the idea of airing roughly edited matches from independent wrestling shows. They went a few weeks without these matches and the show flowed better and didn’t feel as low budget. Why couldn’t this same match have simply been shot at the Impact Zone to fill the television time?
Petey Williams vs. Suicide vs. Rohit Raju vs. Taiji Ishimori: A good spot-fest style match. The problem is that this brought back bad memories of the company opening shows with seemingly pointless multi-man X Division spot-fests. Creative has done a better job of booking more X Division singles matches so hopefully this was just an aberration. Williams going over was logical given that he is cashing in his Feast or Fired contract for a shot at the X Division Title at the Redemption pay-per-view.
GWN Flashback match: It was nice that the broadcast team set up the footage this week considering we’ve seen it just air randomly without any introduction in the past. However, the company continues to act like all of their viewers know what the Global Wrestling Network is. And even the viewers who know that it’s the company’s streaming service could still use an actual strong sales pitch. It’s not that these segments are painful to watch, it’s that they don’t seem to achieve their actual purpose.
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I can’t see them pairing Braxton Sutter with Su Yung long-term. It’s an odd fit. It does make sense short-term though, as it moves him away from Allie, plays into him proposing to almost every knockout on the roster with the bride gimmick, and sets up Yung vs. Allie.
I’m just not sure where they go with Yung vs. Allie long-term. I wouldn’t think they’d want Yung to lose her first feud, but do you take the title off Allie? I honestly find the squeaky/confident hybrid of the Allie character to be a bit annoying at this point in it’s evolution, but she’s one of the few faces they have. So what do you do?
There’s great storyline potential with Allie against “a zombie”. Allie has a childlike innocence to her and even though her persona has had a nice progression, it would be an intriguing variable to have the Yung character cause Allie to regress into fear due to the supernatural aspect. Hopefully they find a way to put Yung over while having this story arc evolve Allie. It also allows Taya to have a strong program with Rosemary to lay the groundwork for a sustainable Knockouts division.