TNA Weekly PPV #9: The Show That Made The Financial Backers Leave

TNA Weekly PPV #9
Date: August 14, 2002
Location: Tennessee State Fairgrounds Arena, Nashville, Tennessee
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Don West, Ed Ferrara

It’s the first show in a somewhat new era for TNA as the Truth is now champion and tonight is challenging for the tag titles with Jarrett. Other than that we have nothing scheduled but I’m sure we’ll have something that makes me angry because of how stupid it is, but then again this is Tennessee so it has to be a bit stupid. Let’s get to it.

Here’s Truth to open the show. We get a somewhat milestone moment for TNA as Truth calls this place the TNA Asylum. He’s a legend now that he’s champion apparently. When he was in the WWF, he couldn’t break certain rules because he’s black. This can’t end well. I mean it can’t. He insists that he isn’t playing the race card, but the line of “and that’s the truth” isn’t invented yet.

Cue Jarrett who calls Truth Walt Disney. Jarrett complains about reverse discrimination (wouldn’t it be discrimination in general?) and wants a shot TONIGHT. Truth says bring it but here’s Bill Behrens looks like a schmuck in a cowboy hat. He says he’s the new sheriff in town and any match between these two at the moment won’t be for the title. Jeff goes after Behrens but Brian Lawler jumps Jeff. He tries to get a fan’s chair but the fan won’t let him have it. Memphis this is not. Lawler shouts that he knew it was Jeff and that’s about it.

The announcers do their welcoming stuff.

Kid Kash/Slim J/Shark Boy vs. Spanish Announce Team

This should be fun. J is 17 years old and is dressed like Eminem. The SAT is comprised of the Maximos (Jose and Joel) and Amazing Red. Kash and I think that’s Jose start things off. They fight over a hammerlock to start before things speed up in a hurry. They trade a bunch of armdrags and it’s a standoff. Jose offers a handshake but Kash flips him off. Joel comes in and they kind of botch a reverse monkey flip.

Joel gets sent up and over to the floor and then out onto the barricade. Kash hits a sweet slingshot rana to the floor and everyone heads to the floor. J and Red are still in the ring and J looks like a 17 year old in over his head. He sends Red to the floor and tries a moonsault press to take out all three guys, nearly smacking his head on the apron in the process. Red hits a much better dive to take out everyone at once. Kash takes out everyone with an even bigger dive than that.

It’s Joel vs. Kash in the ring now but it’s quickly off t J. J keeps grabbing his crotch which can’t be a good thing. He misses a standing corkscrew shooting star and things break down a bit. Jose puts J on his back and Red uses J as a springboard to rana Kash. The rana doesn’t work and it looked badly botched but it was a cool idea. Another cool yet overly complicated idea sees Shark Boy and J having their limbs interlocked while having J put in a camel clutch and Sharky put in a Boston Crab at the same time. Red adds a dropkick to J’s face to end the move.

J charges into a boot, ducks a dive, and hits a kind of flipping kick off the middle rope for two. Kash hooks a freaky standing Boston Crab on Red before they both go up. Kid hits something like a release powerslam off the top which lands with a big crash. J comes in and after shaking his balls again (stop doing that!) he misses a Phoenix Splash.

Shark Boy comes in and everything breaks down again. Shark boy hits Diamond Dust (Dead Sea Drop) on Red followed by the Moneymaker (double underhook piledriver) from Kash for two. J botches another rana and settles for a neckbreaker instead. The double C4 off the top (Spanish Fly) sets up the Infrared (big spinning legdrop) from Red to pin J. Dude deserved the beating.

Rating: C. If I never see Slim J again I’ll be perfectly happy. The guy is your stereotypical indy guy who does a lot of flips and thinks that makes him a wrestler. He botched almost everything he did and STOP GRABBING YOUR CROTCH ALREADY! This had its moments but going nearly 11 minutes is too long to have a match like this, especially with the amount of botches they had in here. Good idea, bad execution.

Dang it it’s the Dupps again. Stan tries to get Goldilocks to touch his crotch (do we have a recurring theme here?) so she does, with a solid right hand. We have an outhouse joke too.

Here’s Bruce to issue an open challenge for the Miss TNA crown. A plant signs a release and we have a match.

Miss TNA: Bruce vs. Tina Hamilton

The fan doesn’t say her name but that’s the name I found for her when I looked it up. Yes, I actually looked it up. The chick takes Bruce down with a spear and some more basic stuff before sending him to the floor. Back in she tries to slam him and gets small packaged for the pin. This gimmick is already old.

Jarrett says he didn’t do anything to Lawler but he’ll play whatever games he needs to in order to win the title. He goes to the men’s room to find Behrens sitting down. Jarrett yells at him and we pan over to Bo Dupp who runs into the midget Teo. Great it’s another hardcore match tonight.

Malice vs. Don Harris

Speaking of matches I don’t care to see, this is last man standing. The New Church is barred from ringside and clearly the words of the authority figures in this company mean SO much right? Harris immediately cracks Malice in the head with a chair for about a six count. Another chair shot puts Malice down again but as Harris loads up a third, Malice throws powder in Harris’ face.

They head to the floor and Malice gets in some more chair shots. Malice is busted open off one of those chair shots. West: “IF THIS HAD BEEN LAST WEEK THE MATCH WOULD BE OVER!” Ferrara: “…..but it’s not last week.” They head up to the stage and Malice throws him off the stage and into the barricade. Malice has a chain but Harris kicks him in the face to take Malice down. Harris chokes him with the chain and loads up a table.

Back in and another big boot puts a chair into Malice’s face. Harris loads up the table in front of the corner but Malice powerbombs Harris down. Harris comes back with a DDT but Malice belly to back superplexes Harris through the table. Don gets up first but Malice falls down at 9, giving Harris the win.

Rating: D+. The only word that comes to my head here is so. As in so what. Why am I supposed to care about this? I have no idea why these guys are fighting other than they were fighting last week and even then I have no idea why they were fighting before that. Also, if you’re going to have first blood and then last man standing, why have the wrestler win the first blood and then the security guy win last man standing? That’s backwards booking.

They pound fists in respect post match. Ok then.

Stan Dupp is afraid of midgets so Bo is fighting tonight.

Dupp Cup: Teo vs. Bo Dupp

Teo is a midget and it’s that stupid points thing again from last week. JB is beaten up, weapons are used, Stan screams which somehow loses points for Bo, weapons are used, and Bo is flushed in a toilet for Teo to win. Somehow that took four minutes and since I rate wrestling, this gets nothing. Thankfully this is the last appearance of the Dupps under this inane gimmick.

We recap Monty Brown vs. Elix Skipper which involved Brown being painted yellow.

Skipper calls Brown a chicken in some very colorful language.

Elix Skipper vs. Monty Brown

This is a street fight because two hardcore based matches in an hour isn’t enough. Skipper tries to jump Brown as he comes out but Brown sneaks up on him in a funny bit. Monty pounds him down to the ring as I guess the match has already started. They head to the ring and Brown chokes Skipper out with a shirt. I’m not entirely sure why these two started fighting in the first place but I think it was something racial.

Brown keeps fiddling with the shirt and the break lets Skipper use the Matrix to avoid a charge and get in some offense. Skipper is a smaller guy and he can’t go toe to toe with Brown so he sticks and moves, which is pretty stupid in a street fight where you can use weapons. Elix brings in a garbage can and blasts away with it, knocking Brown to the floor. Skipper hits the big spot of the match with a slingshot splash onto the can onto Brown which gets two as apparently this is now a hardcore match. Back in and Brown shrugs most of that off, beats on Skipper for a bit, and Alpha Bombs him on a trashcan for the pin.

Rating: D+. What was the point of this? To make Skipper look like a guy that has no chance against someone bigger than he is? Was it to make Brown look like a monster? If it’s either one of those things they didn’t do that at all. I have no idea what the point of this was and it didn’t work for the most part.

The Flying Elvises talk in the back. Well Yang and Estrada talk while Siaki looks away. Siaki turns around and insults Elvis before saying the other two should look up to him rather than Elvis. I think they’re trying to turn Estrada and Yang face but it’s not really working.

X-Division Title: Low Ki vs. Jorge Estrada vs. Sonny Siaki vs. Jimmy Yang

Four corners elimination here. Yang and Estrada have armbands on because it’s been 25 years since Elvis died. There are tags required here so it’s Low Ki vs. Siaki to start. Siaki LAUNCHES Low Ki out of the corner but Low Ki comes back with kicks of course. Siaki takes him down but Estrada tags himself in and hits a running shooting star press for two. Low Ki escapes a suplex and fires away kicks at Estrada including a BIG one to the head.

Tenay says the kicks break your opponents spirits. Estrada gets put in a dragon sleeper, as does Siaki who came in sans tag. Off to Yang who hits what we would call a Rough Ryder to take Low Ki down followed by a middle rope spinwheel kick for no cover. Siaki isn’t even paying attention to the match and Yang escapes the Ki Crusher. Yang is placed on the top rope and chokes Low Ki over the ropes in a Tarantula kind of move.

Low Ki kicks him down and Estrada tags himself in to face Yang. Things speed up with Yang being knocked to the floor. There’s a BIG dive by Estrada and Yang is in trouble. Back in and Estrada hits a tornado DDT which Yang “blocks” (I didn’t see a block) it and dropkicks Estrada down. Yang puts on a Boston Crab and Estrada taps before the referee is even down to check him. That looked odd.

Low Ki sneaks in on Yang and kicks him a bit as is his custom. Yang gets his foot up in the corner to stop a charging champion. A missile dropkick gets two for Yang as Siaki is still not paying attention. Yang goes up but Siaki intentionally crotches him down. Ki Crusher gets us down to one on one. Siaki immediately charges in and pounds away on Low Ki but the clothesline each other down. Low Ki gets up first and hits a springboard spin kick followed by even more kicks to the chest. Siaki hits some kind of freaky looking punch. Yang comes back and decks Siaki, knocking him into a rollup to keep the belt on the kicking dude.

Rating: C. This was more about the angle than the match and I don’t think anyone thought Low Ki was in danger of losing the title. Siaki needs to get away from the other Elvises so he can become a bigger star, which he only kind of did in the future. Not much of a match but there were some good parts to it.

Earlier today, Jerry Lynn left the arena, went to a gas station, and beat up AJ Styles before demanding respect. Ok then.

It’s time for Jive Talking. Tonight’s guest: Dean Baldwin, more famous as Shark Boy but minus the mask here. Disco asks lame jokes about the other Baldwin brothers and does so for awhile. Brian Lawler comes out and yells about Jarrett some more before jumping Disco and getting taken away by security.

Stan Dupp says he’s leaving and Bo is confused/scared.

Tag Titles: AJ Styles/Jerry Lynn vs. Ron Killings/Jeff Jarrett

Truth is world champion and is challenging here so I’ll only refer to Styles and Lynn as champions for the sake of clarity. AJ isn’t here to start so Lynn gets double teamed early on. A double suplex puts Lynn down and here’s AJ for the save. Jarrett takes the drop down/kick sequence from AJ for two. All four are on the floor now with Styles hitting an Asai Moonsault onto Jeff.

Back in and Killings misses a side kick to Lynn and Styles gets dropped face first onto the steps. Lynn monkey flips Killings down and Jarrett is whipped into the barricade. Lynn hits a middle rope bulldog for two as Jarrett saves. All four are in the ring again and Styles misses a moonsault that would have hit Lynn anyway. Jarrett is the first person on the apron but he gets tagged in before he has a single opponent to face.

Ok so it’s Jeff vs. Jerry to start with Jarrett hitting the running hip attack to Lynn who is in 619 position. That and a sitout slam gets two for Jeff and it’s back to Truth. Lynn gets in a shot but a low blow from the Truth takes him right back down. An ax kick gets two for Truth but Jeff’s Stroke is countered. Jeff hooks a sleeper and Jerry is in trouble again. Lynn escapes that as well and puts Jarrett in a figure four which is quickly countered.

Back to Truth who slugs it out with Jerry and does his backflip out of the corner into the splits into the side kick sequence. That gets two but Lynn comes back with a tornado DDT to put both guys down. Off to AJ vs. Jeff with Styles firing off kicks to take over. Jeff tries a sunset flip which AJ rolls through into a Styles Clash attempt and everything breaks down. The champs double team Jarrett for two and load up a springboard Hart Attack, but AJ slips and hits Lynn in the back instead.

AJ accidentally spears the referee down as Lynn hits a reverse DDT on Jarrett. There’s no count because of the referee being down so Lynn cradle piledrives Truth instead but there’s STILL no referee. Jeff hits the Stroke on Lynn as AJ hits Spiral Tap on Truth. A second referee slides in and we’ve got a double pin.

Rating: C. The match was a standard tag match but man alive after two hours of this show I don’t care anymore. The ending sets up the titles being stripped from both teams and eventually a new team would win them. Other than that, there was nothing to see here but some notable botches from AJ.

Bob Armstrong, ANOTHER NWA representative, comes out here and says the titles are held up. Next week it’s Truth vs. Monty Brown for the title. Also next week it’s Styles vs. Lynn in a #1 contenders match for the X Title and Lynn says it should be falls count anywhere. AJ wants it No DQ on top of that, but THAT’S NOT ENOUGH, so Armstrong makes the third fall a ten minute Iron Man match. That’s an official NWA decision, so did Armstrong have that in his pocket just in case two other stipulations were suggested by the wrestlers? Jarrett whines and gets a mystery opponent next week.

Jarrett leaves with the tag titles and runs into Brian Lawler who chokes him and promises to kill Jarrett to end the show. In case you’re curious, Jarrett wouldn’t wrestle next week because these authority figures have no actual authority.

Overall Rating: F. I’m in awe of this show. I didn’t think they could get worse than last week, but that looks like 2000 Raw by comparison. Where do I begin? We had FOUR different Dupp appearances tonight. FOUR TIMES! On top of that we had Ricky Steamboat in charge last week, Cowboy Behrens in charge to start the show and Bob Armstrong in charge to end the show. On top of THAT, other than the main event and Lynn vs. AJ and something about Jarrett, there is nothing interesting or thought out at all here. Horrible show and after this one, the financial backers pulled out. Can you blame them?

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