Impact Wrestling
Date: October 26, 2017
Location: Impact Zone, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Josh Matthews, Jeremy Borash

We’re back in Orlando and whatever other city/country they’re using material from this week. That’s the major issue at this point: a lot of Impact isn’t so much from Orlando but rather from all over the world. It’s nice once in a while but it’s mainly just showing how horrible the Impact Zone is. Let’s get to it.

Dan Lambert, Bobby Lashley, Moose and Stephan Bonnar arrived earlier today.

Johnny Mundo arrived earlier.

Opening sequence.

We recap Team AAA vs. Team Impact.

From AAA in Mexico.

James Storm/Ethan Carter III vs. El Hijo de Fantasma/Texano

It’s a brawl to start with Fantasma being double teamed in the corner. Texano pulls Carter outside and posts him as the brawling continues. Storm beats on Fantasma against the barricade as Carter stomps on Texano inside. The announcers recap why this feud started, which all began when Hector Guerrero didn’t vote for Fantasma in a Grand Championship match? Remember that? Remember the Grand Championship? Remember Hector Guerrero being involved in this feud? You shouldn’t, as he hasn’t been mentioned since that initial appearance.

Rating: D. This was barely a match and was much more about advancing Fantasma vs. Texano, which is a feud I didn’t even know existed coming into this show. The story continues to be a combination of uninteresting and bad here as apparently it’s over that Grand Championship match from a few weeks back. I’m sure this is leading to a six man tag at Bound For Glory, even though there’s next to no interest in this whole thing (which to be fair could apply to the company as a whole at this point).

Eli Drake is on the phone when he runs into Dutch Mantel. Apparently Eli is missing media appearances and marketing calls so Dutch wants to know what’s up. Drake blows them off and says those things aren’t important before returning to the phone. It’s not clear who he’s talking to but Drake thinks it’s time they came back.

After a break, Jim Cornette, Scott D’Amore and Mantel yell about Drake. Scott leaves to make sure they have a show tonight. Cornette comes up with an idea: if Drake loses the title, this whole thing might work itself out.

From Border City Wrestling in Windsor, Ontario, Canada.

GFW Tag Team Titles: OVE vs. Phil Atlas/Brent Banks

OVE is defending and we’re joined in progress with Dave and Atlas coming in off hot tags. Phil is taken into the corner and kicked in the face for his efforts. Jake gets two off a dropkick as the announcers talk about almost anything else. Not that it matters as Brent comes in again with a dropkick of his own and a front flip into a nip up. Dave sends the champs into each other but Banks hits a falling cutter. A top rope elbow gives Banks two but it’s the spike tombstone to Brent to retain the titles at 5:10 shown.

Rating: C-. Who are Phil Atlas and Brent Banks and why does GFW think I’m interested in them? Better yet, what is Border City Wrestling? AAA and Pro Wrestling Noah are big deals but the Crash and Border City aren’t exactly household names, or really even big time indies. They’re just promotions that are included occasionally and it’s not like this is outstanding action or anything like that. It’s another match that doesn’t do anything for me and that’s been the case since these international matches started.

Another long recap of Moose/Bonnar vs. American Top Team. By the way we’re 24 minutes into the show and we haven’t seen any wrestlers in the Impact Zone arena.

Drake won’t do an interview and texts someone instead.

From Pro Wrestling Noah in Tokyo.

GHC Title: Eddie Edwards vs. Naomichi Marafuji

Edwards is defending. Feeling out process to start as they run the ropes with neither being able to get much of an advantage. It’s a standoff and we’re clipped to Eddie hitting a Blue Thunder Bomb for two. An enziguri knocks Marafuji off the top but he comes back with a no sold Saito suplex. A hard shot to the chest drops Marafuji and we’re clipped to Edwards not being able to hit a suplex.

Clipped again to Marafuji kicking Eddie in the head to stop a dive. They head outside with the pads being pulled back. Eddie can’t hit a piledriver on the concrete but settles for a superkick instead. Another clip takes us to Eddie hitting a nasty suicide dive. Clipped again to Eddie getting piledriven on the apron (good looking crash) and yet again to Marafuji hitting a top rope C4 for two.

Another clip has Eddie grabbing a super hurricanrana, followed by another clip into the Boston Knee Party getting two. A tiger bomb gets two more and it’s an Emerald Fusion to retain Eddie’s title at 6:36 shown. Way too many clips to fairly rate this but this looked to be a heck of a match, which ran about twenty six minutes in full.

Marafuji shakes his hand post match.

OVE is sick of LAX and has a friend to help them out. We don’t see his face but he gives a thumbs up, which switches to a thumbs down. That’s the pose of Sami Callihan, who has been rumored to be coming to the promotion.

Drake says he doesn’t have time to talk but is ready for his tag match against Johnny Impact and Garza Jr.

Laurel Van Ness is in the arena with two glasses of champagne. She’s the first GFW talent in the arena tonight and we’re 47 minutes into the show.

Back to Border City Wrestling in Windsor, Ontario, Canada.

Petey Williams vs. Idris Abraham vs. Tarik vs. Kiyomiya

One fall to a fall and it’s a brawl to start with Kiyomiya getting knocked down, setting up a brawl between Abraham and Tarik. Abraham gets put in the Tree of Woe for O Canada and we’re clipped to Petey hitting running corner dropkicks. Petey dives onto Kiyomiya and grabs a crucifix for two on Tarik.

Back in and Abraham starts cleaning house with some forearms, only to have Tarik send him into the corner for a running elbow. What looks to be a Cross Rhodes is broken up and it’s Tarik hitting Ricochet’s Benadryller for two on Kiyomiya. Petey comes back in with a bicycle kick and it’s the Canadian Destroyer to put Tarik away at 5:55.

Rating: C. Pretty standard four way match and I’m not even going to bother making the same complaints that I’ve made so far. The other problem here is this was a way to showcase Petey Williams. That’s all well and good, but is there NO ONE else that could get this kind of a spotlight? I mean, of course that would suggest actually putting the focus in the arena and on GFW, which isn’t the point of this show, at least in the first half.

Recap of Impact vs. Drake.

Eli Drake/Chris Adonis vs. Johnny Impact/Garza Jr.

Adonis shoves Garza into the corner to start and Garza TAKES OFF HIS….shirt. Dang it that’s quite the tease. An enziguri puts Adonis down and it’s off to Impact for some double chops. Chris pulls Impact’s hair from the apron though and Drake comes in to hammer away. Everything breaks down for a big and Drake clears the ring without too much effort.

Adonis adds a clothesline to take Johnny down but he sends the villains into each other, allowing the hot tag to Garza. That means IT’S TIME FOR GARZA TO TAKE OFF HIS PANTS, followed by a superkick to Adonis. Stereo moonsaults get two on Drake but Garza gets knocked down as we take a break.

Back with Garza getting double teamed in the corner and Adonis doing his biceps pose (This guy might have fewer moves than Kevin Nash). We hit a camel clutch for a bit before it’s off to Drake for a bad looking powerslam. Garza kicks him away though and it’s the hot tag to Johnny. A running knee to Adonis sets up the springboard corkscrew crossbody with Drake making the save. Everything breaks down and Adonis hits Drake by mistake, allowing Johnny to grab a rollup for the pin at 14:02.

Rating: C. Just a tag match here though they made a point of having Drake avoid Impact. They’ve set up a nice little story for the title match, but the company is kidding themselves if they think this is the top story going into the pay per view. The World Champion shouldn’t be taking a huge backseat to something that isn’t a really important feud and that’s not something Bound For Glory has.

Alberto El Patron is returning at Bound For Glory.

Video on Trevor Lee coming to the Crash and wondering who he’s facing for the X-Division Title.

From the Crash in Tijuana, Mexico.

X-Division Title: Trevor Lee vs. Ultimo Ninja

Lee is defending, which shouldn’t be that surprising as we haven’t seen Ninja (Garza Jr.’s brother) before. Ninja wastes no time in taking Lee down for a dropsault. Lee sends him outside and scores with the running apron kick to the chest. Back in and things slow down again with Lee slowly stomping and posing a lot. Ninja fights back with a missile dropkick for two, followed by a running flip dive to the floor. A spinning kick to Lee’s face gets two more on Lee but he raises his boots to block a moonsault. The standing double stomp retains Lee’s title at 6:00.

Rating: D+. It’s not a good sign when the fans who know Ninja didn’t seem to care about him either. This was a short match with two guys not doing much of anything special. There was no reason to believe that the title was changing hands, making it just a step ahead of an old school squash.

Global Forged.

King Mo doesn’t like Moose or Bonnar. You remember King Mo right? He’s that MMA guy who shows up every few years, doesn’t do anything important and leaves again without most people realizing he’s gone. But he a Bellator mainstay so he’s always being brought back. His history with TNA isn’t mentioned here so if you don’t know that stuff coming in, he’s just an MMA fighter with a big mouth.

Moose vs. Bobby Lashley

Bonnar and Lambert are the seconds here. They don’t waste time as it’s Moose taking him into the corner to start for some hard forearms to the chest. Lashley sends him into the corner as well for some forearms of his own. Moose puts him on the top for a dropkick out to the floor as we take a break.

Back with Lambert grabbing Moose’s leg so Lashley can kick him to the floor. Lambert gets in some choking with a boot as he’s holding some kind of trophy. Lashley hits some posing on the floor and stomps away on Moose back inside. There’s something to be said about someone who can do all the power stuff and wrestle a strong amateur style going with a simple offense instead.

It’s quite the heel move as he’s basically saying he doesn’t need to go to the good stuff when simple offense is more than enough. A chinlock doesn’t last long and it’s Moose coming back with the bicycle kick. Moose’s hesitation dropkick connects but Lambert comes in for the DQ at 11:41.

Rating: C. Something that has gone under the radar in this feud: Dan Lambert is a pretty good heel manager. He’s obnoxious and condescending and can talk fairly well, but he’s stuck in this terrible story. Kind of a shame really. Anyway this worked well and they were smart to do the non-finish with less than two weeks before Bound For Glory. Lashley and Moose are good choices for power guys and you can almost guarantee a tag match at the pay per view. I have no idea why we’re not just seeing this singles match there, but I’m assuming it’s something about the company thinking wrestling fans care about MMA.

Moose and Bonnar clean house post match with Moose powerbombing one of the American Top Team guys onto the pile. The MMA guys bail to the stage and Moose throws out a challenge for Six Sides of Steel at Bound For Glory.

A promo for LAX vs. OVE wraps us up.

Overall Rating: D-. They do know that Bound For Glory is in less than two weeks? You really could have cut this show down to about thirty five minutes and no one would have noticed the difference. There were seven matches on this show and three of them (one of which was heavily clipped) involved wrestlers with matches actually on the pay per view card. It really does feel like they’re throwing whatever they can out there and hoping people watch.

I know they have some issues with filling in so much content over the way too long marathon taping sessions but filling it in with this isn’t working. There’s a good chance that they’re going to do the exact same thing with the Ottawa tapings and that’s going to make for some very, very long episodes in the future. This show was hard to sit through and that’s with a goal in sight. How bad is it going to be when they don’t have a pay per view for another eight months?

Results

James Storm/Ethan Carter III b. El Hijo de Fantasma/Texano – Last Call to Fantasma

OVE b. Phil Atlas/Brent Banks – Spike tombstone to Banks

Eddie Edwards b. Naomichi Marafuji – Emerald Fusion

Petey Williams b. Tarik, Idris Abraham and Kiyomiya – Canadian Destroyer to Tarik

Johnny Impact/Garza Jr. b. Eli Drake/Chris Adonis – Rollup to Adonis

Trevor Lee b. Ultimo Ninja – Standing double stomp

Moose b. Bobby Lashley via DQ when Dan Lambert interfered

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the Updated History of the Intercontinental Title in E-Book or Paperback. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2017/10/02/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-the-intercontinental-title-updated-version/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Impact Wrestling
Date: October 12, 2017
Location: Impact Zone, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Josh Matthews, Jeremy Borash

We’re less than a month away from Bound For Glory and some of the card is starting to come together. You can pretty much guess a lot of the things they’re going to do, though one question is will Moose manage to do something dumber than walk into an MMA gym alone and pick a fight. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of Eli Drake and Chris Adonis attacking Johnny Impact, only to have Garza Jr. interrupt. This sets up Impact vs. Garza for the Bound For Glory title shot.

Garza says he’ll win. No dude, you won’t.

Opening sequence.

We look at Eddie Edwards winning the GHC Title and Garza trying to win the title. As usual, GFW is really, really overestimating how interesting these other companies are.

Eli Drake is defending the title in Japan this week.

Here’s LAX with something to say. They want their title match right now and don’t care what rules they have to abide by. This brings out OVE to say bring it, even if it’s a 5150 street fight. The champs don’t care but Diamante says it’s all of LAX vs. OVE at the same time. The match, and the brawl, is on with the champs getting beaten down, including Dave being sent through a table at ringside.

We look at a press conference announcing GFW wrestlers going over to Tokyo to invade Pro Wrestling Noah. Is it really an invasion if you announce a working relationship and hold a press conference announcing the matches? More on this later, because we’re just that lucky.

Video on American Top Team, including them attacking various GFW employees and Moose going to their gym and getting beaten down. This is a compilation of clips and packages we’ve seen before.

Another video on Garza Jr. By the way it’s 8:31 and we haven’t had a match yet. I’m not sure if that’s a complaint or not.

Rosemary vs. Hannah Harper

Red Wedding ends Harper in 59 seconds. Nearly half of that was them staring at each other.

Post match Rosemary calls out Taya Valkyrie for a dance with the demon. Taya comes out and mists Rosemary for a change of pace, followed by the Road to Valhalla.

We look at Moose getting beaten down at the American Top Team facility.

Moose is going back to the facility, but this time he has backup.

Here’s Taryn Terrell to tell us all to shut up. She’s got a Knockouts Title shot at Bound For Glory but now she wants to focus on Gail Kim. Taryn talks about Gail’s husband Robert Irvine and says after she’s done, they’ll be heading appearing on Divorce Court. Gail comes out and says she won’t be attacking Taryn, only to slap her anyway.

Alberto El Patron is back at Bound For Glory. DANG IT MAN JUST GO AWAY ALREADY!!!

Sienna is ready for a mixed tag tonight and can’t wait to beat up Allie. One of her partners, Texano, says AAA is awesome. The other partner, Caleb Konley, says North Carolina is awesome.

Grado is very tired and says no more. Joseph Park comes up in an expensive car with a bunch of good looking women. They’re just interns, though one of them calls Grado the meal ticket. Grado isn’t happy as Park leaves with the ladies.

Wrestlers talk about the importance of Bound For Glory. This is probably the fifth promo for the show in the first hour to go with the 53 seconds of in-ring action.

We’re an hour into this show and it’s been little more than a recap show so far. 53 seconds of wrestling and an announcement of a tag match for the pay per view. Wrestling Challenge was run better than this.

Sienna/Caleb Konley/Texano vs. Allie/Dezmond Xavier/James Storm

We finally break a whole minute of wrestling an hour and nine minutes into the show. Sienna stomps Allie in the corner to start but gets taken down with a clothesline. It’s off to Texano vs. Storm but Konley comes in instead. Some villainous cheating has Storm in trouble but Storm is quickly out of a chinlock. A leg lariat gives Texano two and Sienna stomps away as well.

Texano gets dropped again and the diving tag brings in Xavier. Kicks abound and a standing corkscrew moonsault gets two with Sienna making the save. Everything breaks down and it’s a Codebreaker from Allie into a Backstabber from Storm. Konley comes back in with a swinging slap, only to have Xavier hit a 619 around the post. Lee breaks up something off the top but it’s the Last Call to end Konley at 6:38.

Rating: D+. Normally I’m a fan of throwing a bunch of feuds into one match but what happens when the feuds aren’t interesting in the slightest? This was more evidence that Bound For Glory isn’t an interesting show as the TV building it up isn’t compelling in the slightest. There’s no reason for AAA and GFW to be feuding and Xavier feels like he hasn’t been around in weeks. I’m sure he’ll be in the X Title match at the pay per view because that’s what they do with that title most of the time. More uninspired booking here, which is becoming a trend.

Here’s a slightly different package on the wrestlers in Japan. Some of the quotes and clips are the same.

Yet ANOTHER video on Garza Jr., this time of him in Japan.

This week’s Global Forged as this show is allergic to wrestling. This one focuses on Jon Bolen, the head trainer.

LAX is ready for the street fight.

Moose went to the American Top Team facility again (we’ve seen the clip of him on the phone at least five times now), though this time he has backup. Fellow MMA fighter Stephan Bonnar (not named until after the segment is over) is there this time though and they have pipes. They walk in and that’s all for now.

Garza Jr. vs. Johnny Impact

The winner faces Eli Drake at Bound For Glory. Feeling out process to start until Impact takes him down with a headlock. Garza sends him outside for a suicide dive as the announcers promise more American Top Team stuff later tonight. Johnny is back up with a flipping elbow off the steps and we take a break. Back with Garza forearming Impact in the corner but LET’S TAKE OFF THOSE PANTS!

Some kicks to the face have Johnny in trouble and they slug it out, followed by a crossbody to put both guys down. Back up and Johnny kicks him down for two more but he has to bail out of Starship Pain. A second attempt completely misses and Garza gets two off a standing moonsault. Garza’s missile dropkick gets another near fall but a pinfall reversal sequence goes to Impact for the pin at 13:50.

Rating: C+. I don’t know how else to say it but no one cares about Garza. He’s just a guy who was in the lucha tag team and then he’s randomly in the #1 contenders match. A bunch of packages on him for one night isn’t enough to make me care about him in this spot, especially when they weren’t hiding the fact that Impact was winning.

Post match Cornette comes in to interview Impact but Adonis comes in and breaks a board over his head.

And now, back to the real story with American Top Team and UFC LEGEND (yes UFC LEGEND I say, along with JB who says it multiple times) Stephan Bonnar. Everyone is gone (it’s the middle of the night) so they just break stuff with the pipes instead and Moose steals some MMA belts. They also wreck the merchandise area. This is the way they’re hyping up the biggest show of the year people. It’s the best idea they have. Moose leaves a note with the receptionist (who didn’t say a word while in the same room where all this was happening) to end the show.

Overall Rating: D-. This is only above a failure because the main event wasn’t bad. I just sat through two hours of Bound For Glory ads, the same clip of Moose on the phone saying he needed help, videos that didn’t make me interested in Garza Jr. and GFW in Japan. If you take out the commercial from the main event, there was less than twenty minutes of action on the show and less than two minutes out of the first seventy were spent on wrestling.

I know they’re strapped with all the taping marathons and such but with this many wrestlers running around, there’s really no excuse to have almost no one to put on the shows. Come up with something better than a squash, a six person tag and a really obvious main event. With as many people as they have, including all the talent they bring in, there’s not much of an excuse for this. This show wasn’t so much bad as it was unacceptable, which is much worse.

Results

Rosemary b. Hannah Harper – Red Wedding

James Storm/Dezmond Xavier/Allie b. Sienna/Caleb Konley/Texano – Last Call to Konley

Johnny Impact b. Garza Jr. – Rollup

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the Updated History of the Intercontinental Title in E-Book or Paperback. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2017/10/02/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-the-intercontinental-title-updated-version/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6