By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
TNA Impact Hits
Eddie Edwards and JDC vs. Nic Nemeth and Joe Hendry: The heels going over was a surprising move, but it was set up nicely with Hendry accidentally taking out Nemeth, which led to Edwards getting the pin. It was unclear if Hendry would be moved out of the title picture once he lost at Bound For Glory, but they are clearly building to a rematch between him and Nemeth that may have a different dynamic. Hendry implied that Nemeth was in cahoots with John Layfield. Nemeth talked his way out of it, but it’s still possible that his character was lying and the company is building to a Nemeth heel turn.
Frankie Kazarian: Kazarian’s heel mic work was top notch on the Bound For Glory go-home show, and he came back with a hilarious impersonation of Joe Hendry coming out of the event. Where has this Kazarian been all these years? Kazarian has successfully moved from feeling like a legacy act forced into the title picture to feeling like a relevant player who is legitimately worthy of world title consideration.
“First Class” AJ Francis and KC Navarro vs. “The Rascalz” Trey Miguel and Zachary Wentz: It was odd to see First Class beat The Rascalz clean. Miguel and Wentz were given a big boost by their NXT crossover appearances and should be pushed among the top acts in the company. That said, one loss isn’t going to derail them. I assume that First Class is being set up to challenge Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy for the TNA Tag Team Titles. On a side note, Francis is doing really nice work as a heel. He was the butt of jokes by the end of his WWE run, but he’s bounced back nicely in TNA with consistently good heel mic work.
TNA Impact Misses
Steve Maclin, Jonathan Gresham, and Eric Young vs. Josh Alexander, Jason Hotch, and John Skyler: I could have done without TNA playing up Alexander teaming with two mystery partners as opposed to simply announcing in advance that he would team with The Good Hands. If nothing else, the match served as a solid bounce back win for Maclin coming out of his loss to Alexander at Bound For Glory.
Ash By Elegance vs. Dani Luna: A minor Miss. Ash going over presumably sets up her and Heather Reckless as the next challengers for the Knockouts Tag Team Titles. The bigger issue continues to be that Luna and Jody Threat haven’t connected with the masses. Threat gets some good reactions when TNA runs in areas that are familiar with Threat’s independent work, but they play to mostly quiet crowds in most cities.
Lei Ying Lee vs. Maggie Moore: This was a simple spotlight win for Lee. The issue with the match was the atmosphere. The live crowd seemed to use this match as a bathroom break given the number of empty seats opposite the hard camera.
BFG follow-up show: A minor Miss. This wasn’t a bad episode, but it was far from the type of hot show one expects coming out of a company’s biggest event of the year. Of course, Chris Bey and El Hijo del Vikingo suffered serious injuries at the television tapings and the company clearly had to make some changes to the show. Vikingo’s match was pulled from the show and replaced by footage from his BFG match with Mike Bailey. In other words, the company had valid reasons for this show falling below expectations.
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