TNA iMPACT: 02/15/2007 Review

By Casey Trowbridge

Welcome to our on-going coverage of WWE Raw and TNA iMPACT. Wade has been doing Raw for an hour now and it is time for me to step in with iMPACT.

This is TNA...We are, not worth a funny line here.



Show opens with highlights and we're being generous here with that description from Against All Odds. I guess because we're going head-to-head with Raw we're going to fool people by starting with a Raw promo.

Scott Steiner comes out. He says Christian wanted to know if he knew how to beat Angle, and he did but didn't think it would be easy. Steiner says that negotiations on his contract were put on hold so TNA could sign Angle. Steiner, you should be thankful. Steiner claims to have beaten John Cena, Batista and it didn't matter how many times HHH slept with the bosses daughter, he beat him as well.

Steiner talks some more smack and out comes Kurt Angle for a rebuttal of sorts.

Angle doesn't know Steiner but knows he's got a rep for being a self-centered egomaniac. Angle says he'd gladly kick Steiner's ass for free. TNA's cost cutting measures at their best. He says he came to this company for the company and to go head-to-head with WWE. Steiner says screw him, and screw the company. Angle wants to know if Steiner is going to talk or if he's going to do something. Steiner takes the first blow and then Angle starts with the Suplexing. Germans, belly-to-belly and so on. Fans of humility be dismayed that no camel clutch followed and rejoyce that no ass fucking followed that.

Out comes Tomko and it is 2 on 1. Samoa Joe makes the save. Angle promised Joe a title shot even though he's not the champion. Angle tells Joe that he's got it in the gauntlet for the gold, and may the best man win.

Now we get the usual iMPACT opening.

Elevation X is being lowered down to the ring. We've got a 14 man gauntlet for the gold tonight for a title shot at Destination X.

JB is backstage with LAX. Konnan does the talking and lays a verbal smackdown, no not WWE Smackdown, but the verbal edition on Team 3D. I've got no problem with this.

Commercial Break!!
I've got no problem with the way the first segment went down even if it was all talking with a brief brawl mixed in.

We're back with Christian Cage with the ranting and the raving. He protests the Gauntlet match and tries to get Tomko and Steiner to coexist and ensure no title shot for anything. Steiner is not down with this and lets Christian know and this includes Tomko being called a redneck.

Match 1: Sharkboy and Norman Smiley Vs. The Latin American Xchange w/Konnan
No Spanish intro, and that greatly disappoints me.

LAX waste no time with the muds and the holes and the stomping of holes full of mud. In other words, they start kicking the crap out of Boy and Smiley before the bell.

Sitout powerbomb on Sharkboy by Hernandez and a Senton from Homicide and that ends the match.

Winners: LAX - 1:00 if that.
A serving of squash with a side of squash. I've got no problem with the accasional squash match.

Brother Ray starts to cut a promo and some dorkus from the Sapranos shows up as well. Brother Ray translates this guys words in to next week we're going to have a belting pot match. I'll save you the long version of his explanation of what that is, by saying lumberjacks with straps.
So, Team 3D challenges LAX to an anything goes streetfight and they lose. So of course, they get to dictate the stips for the next match as well. It is best not to think about it.

Konnan says that LAX is going to be on Team 3D like a monkey on a cupcake or Team 3D on a pizza. He also gets in a goodfellas reference.

We get a brief video recapping the silliness at the pay per view between Eric Young and Traci Brooks. Wehn I say silliness I don't mean it in the funny sense just so we're clear.

Backstage, Eric Young plays the role that so many men have in history by telling Traci: "But, but, you said that you love me". Traci laughs at him and introduces him to reality. Robert Roode comes in and tells him not to talk to her because that's not his job. His job is to help make sure Robert Roode wins the Gauntlet for the Gold.

Commercial Break!!
Hey, another relatively focused segment, plus it contained more Konnan talking, an LAX squash and at the end of it I actually remember what happened at the beginning of it.

Although between commercials we saw: Christian, Tomko, Steiner, Team 3D, LAX, Sharkboy, Norman Smiley, Robert Roode, Traci and Eric Young.

Inside the UFC commercial airs for a Tim Sylvia interview. Still trying to talk myself out of picking him at UFC 68.

Lockdown commercial airs, and no they haven't ditched the all cage format if you were curious.

A recap airs of the silliness, used in the same context as before, involving James Storm, Ms. Tennessee, Gail Kim, Petey Williams and Chris Harris.

Match 2: Arm Wrestling Match - Gail Kim Vs. Ms. Tennessee
Jacqi Moore

James Storm's music sounds vaguely familiar but I can't place it.

5 people chant "Brokeback Mountain" at Storm. Referee Slick Johnson overseeing the armwrestling match.

Gail Kim is victorious in the match. However, this just triggars a brawl in which Storm immediately becomes involved. Here comes Petey Williams to make the save or at least attempt it. Chris Harris comes out and does a significantly better job of clearing house than does Petey.

Latisha is backstage with Chris Sabin. She actually manages to ask the question and it is about next week's ladder match for the top contendership to the X-title. Sabin babbles incoherently either to make fun of the interviewer or old people. Bob Backlund shows up and says his friends at the senior citizen lunchen in Connedicutt don't appreciate his mockery.

Then we move to a skit with Nash, and some of the X-guys and I guess they're doing x-division idol. All you need to know is singing was involved. Someone busted out Amazing Grace. Jay Lethal impersonates Randy Savage and I don't mean in his wrestling skill just so we're clear.

Commercial Break!
Well, the string of good segments comes crashing to a hault. Just too much whatever in this one for my liking.

Ron Killings is back in his horrible movie roles.

Sting and Abyss video package. I'm sad that Jim Mitchell will be off of TV for awhile as Mitchell is a great, great man.

Match 3: 14 man Gauntlet for the Gold
2 minute periods between entries, last 2 men wrestle in a singles match all others are eliminated by going over the top rope and having both feet touch the floor.

Wrestler 1: Sting
Wrestler 2: AJ Styles

I'll try to keep track of who comes out and when they're eliminated and by whom, but if I don't care then I don't care. Jim Cornette has just randomly shown up at the broadcast booth. Don't get me wrong I'm glad he's there, but he just happened to appear.

Ok, there's no way that it is 2 minute periods as we've already got our next entry and it is:

Wrestler 3: Rhino

This is not good news for AJ Styles as Rhino still seems to be pissed at him.

Commercial Break!!
That's 1 short segment, I guess so they can avoid another break during this match.

I'd say that the entries are about 45 seconds apart. Of course in Russo time 45 seconds is roughly 2 weeks 1 day 16 hours 13 minutes 44 seconds and 1/8 of a second to be more exact.

Lockdown tickets go on sale tomorrow. A Christopher Daniels promo airs bringing us out of the break. This couldn't have aired before the match started?

Wrestlers entered during the break and they were:

Wrestler 4: Chris Sabin
Wrestler 5: James Storm
Wrestler 6: Kip James

and just as we returned, we got...

Wrestler 7: Abyss

Abyss comes in and he sends Chris Sabin packing shortly thereafter.

Wrestler 8: Kurt Angle
Maybe its only 30 seconds because they're coming out Fast and Furious, well at least they're coming out fast you'd have to ask them if they're furious.

Wrestler 9 Tomko
He comes out and he dumps both AJ Styles and Rhino for their trouble. Styles and Rhino seem to be linked forever.

Wrestler 10: Samoa Joe
Jim Cornette says: "As a friend of mine would say, business is picking up".

He remember my theory for the short commercial break before? Screw that as they just took another 1. That was roughly a 2 minute segment not counting the Daniels thing. That's weird.

This kind of match does not lend itself well to the format of television.

Bodog fight commercial, fun fact, my ION affiliate didn't show that show on Tuesday which greatly disappoints me. Perhaps I'll see if the USA Vs. Russia show advertised is on.

A snickers commercial airs and its not the one with the 2 dudes kissing that debuted during the Super Bowl and did unspeakable damage to the brand. Oh, and I never thought that Iron Sheik would have something in common with Tim Hardaway.

Wrestlers entering during the break: Eric Young, Robert Roode and B.G. James, not necessarily in that order.

Wrestler 14: Scott Steiner
B.G. James is eliminated shortly after Steiner entered.

Abyss was eliminated by Samoa Joe and Kurt Angle was next to go at the hands of Steiner and Tomko.

Roode had Sting ready to go out, called for Eric Young to help, he hesitated and Robert Roode would be eliminated by Sting. Sting was promptly dumped by Steiner.

Eric Young was next out, and we're down to 3 Tomko, Joe and Steiner.

Not sure when Kip James was tossed and guess how much I care to go find out?

Tomko and Steiner are playing a game of "Can you top this?" unfortunately for Joe, he is whom they are playing it on.

Tenay says it appears that Steiner and Tomko are unified at this point. Expect problems shortly. Joe teases elimination. Steiner is eliminated as Joe managed to sneak back in.

They wrestle for a bit and a muscle buster is executed. If you don't know by whom, and what the result is, then you just don't pay enough attention.

Winner: Samoa Joe
Christian is out, the goons attack Joe and Angle comes to even the odds as the show ends.

Thoughts: This isn't saying much in reality, but this was probably the best iMPACT in a couple of months. Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt that Raw was way better than this show.
The first half was better than the second. The Gauntlet was hurt by the 2 commercial breaks that screwed up the flow. I've seen so many worse episodes though.
Sorry for the lack of jokes as compared to usual, for some reason I wasn't in a joking mood tonight.
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