By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
Impact Wrestling Hits
Dez and Wentz vs. Trey Miguel and Rich Swann: A really fun main event that served as the farewell for The Rascalz. Impact deserves credit for not being petty and avoiding the usual pro wrestling approach of burying wrestlers on their way out the door and never acknowledging their departures. More on The Rascalz later.
Moose vs. Willie Mack in a No DQ match: A well worked match designed to make Moose look more dangerous than ever with the ref stoppage finish and the post match beatdown. I’m all for a serious and dangerous Moose. But Impact creative has to know that it’s counterproductive to have him carrying around the defunct TNA Championship belt because it makes him look like a flake rather than unstable in a frightening way.
Eric Young and Joe Doering: The duo interrupting the Suicide vs. Gio match was a nice showcase for Doering, along with their backstage attack on Rhino. Young dropped the Impact World Championship at Bound For Glory and then lost a brief rematch to Rich Swann on Impact, so the addition of Doering to his act provides some needed juice coming off those high profile losses.
Turning Point highlight package: More than anything, it’s worth acknowledging that Impact made one of their Impact Plus shows feel important. Most of their Impact Plus events were booked in a way that made them feel trivial. The shows were fine if you saw them, yet they rarely felt like something viewers actually needed to see in order to keep up on the product. In this case, the company delivered multiple title changes. The new approach can only help boost Impact Plus subscriptions.
Brian Myers vs Crazzy Steve: Another win for Myers, who is washing away the loser vibe that he brought with him from his WWE run as Curt Hawkins. It’s nice to see Myers featured in a new light. I wish Impact would do more with Steve, who has been a comedy figure in many of the company’s sports entertainment style skits. How about taking a darker and more serious approach with the Joker-like persona?
Impact Wrestling Misses
The Rascalz in Impact Wrestling: It was very telling that Impact’s flashback package spotlighted the trio’s comedy antics in the treehouse rather than their greatest in-ring moments. While there were plenty of really good Rascalz matches, Impact never pushed the trio as the major players that they really should have been. Trey Miguel received a small push as a singles wrestler, yet he seemed to lose every high profile match. Dez and Wentz are a terrific team, yet it felt like they lost as many matches as they won. The Impact creative team typically gets it right when it comes to the wrestlers they push, but for some reason they just never got fully behind this talented trio the way they should have. Here’s hoping they find the right fit in their next stop and get a more fitting push.
Tenille Dashwood and Alisha Edwards vs. Havok and Nevaeh in a Knockouts Tag Title tournament match: Havok and Nevaeh have lost more than a monster team should in Impact, so perhaps this is a sign that things are changing for them. Either way, this just wasn’t a memorable opener to the tournament. It didn’t help that I wasn’t sure which team the company wanted fans to pull for. Dashwood is a heel, Edwards has been a babyface, and I assume that Havok and Nevaeh are heels, though I’m still not entirely sure coming out of that ambiguous feud they had with Kiera Hogan and Tasha Steelz.
Su Yung: We didn’t even see her on the show, but Impact broke out the awful special effects they use whenever they drift into hocus pocus mode. In this case, it occurred while Deonna Purrazzo and Kimber Lee were talking backstage. The bad effects add nothing to the show and are clearly a turnoff for some viewers. I wish Impact creative would make the Yung character more realistic by booking her in a way where it’s clear that she is playing mind games rather than asking viewers to believe she has special powers.
Hernandez vs. Fallah Bahh: I couldn’t care less about the wad of cash that apparently no one wants to actually spend, so it was hard to care about this match.
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