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1. The Announcing
Ever since Don West started his heel turn after he blamed Mike Tenay for not being on his side in a meeting, I have thought that the announcing has improved a lot. One criticism that people made about the team of Don and Mike was that there never seemed to be a time when someone wasn’t talking. Over the last few weeks, Don and Mike were allowing the action to tell the story and treat the fans like they can digest what they are seeing without someone telling the viewers what is going on.
Because you have the ‘face’ announcer in Mike Tenay as well as the ‘heel’ announcer in Don West, you had the opportunity for some good back and forth banter where Don would talk about his association with the heels. Don gave a good explanation of this in his recent interview with Mike Johnson, which I highly recommend listening to if you have not already done so. Another thing that Don was doing was pointing out things that were logical. One of my favorite Donisms before leaving the announce table was when he pointed out that the fans in the Impact Zone were chanting ‘USA’ during a match involving a British and Mexican wrestler. Those subtle things enhance the program and shows that the fans who notice this aren’t the only ones who are talking about some inconsistencies.
You can add me in the group of people who enjoyed Don West as an announcer during his time with Mike Tenay. He was a good counter to Mike Tenay’s knowledge of the business and he provided an enthusiasm for the product to make you care. Because of the things that I mentioned above, I was a bit disappointed when I heard that Taz was going to take over his position on camera. However, if Don is going to be able to devote more time to build the merchandise segment of the company, it is probably the best thing for the company with the signing of Taz.
Now that Taz is at the announce table, it allows Mike and Taz to build on what we saw over the last few months. Both men are very knowledgeable about the business and they both provide excellent insight into the product. Even though Taz has been affiliated with the Main Event Mafia and Samoa Joe, Taz has not shown any apparent biases in his commentary so it looks like we are going to get an honest commentary instead of a shill for one group or wrestler. If they need that, they can add someone to come out who is scouting a match or a partner of one of the wrestlers in the match.
2. The Women’s Division
At the end of 2005, I wrote a column talking about the X Division, the different levels of the wrestlers in the division, and what needed to be done to help build that division beyond the top wrestlers. I think there is a similar structure in the women’s division, but because you are only going to see one or two matches at most, you only need to have four or five strong wrestlers to keep the division viable while continuing to build the division.
While I might not be the biggest fan of what they are doing with the women’s title at this time, the title matches are not the only thing that needs to be utilized. If they save the title matches for the pay per views but build up the contenders for the title on Impact, you add the possibility of more credible challengers for the title instead of seeing the same two or three people every month doing the same match.
The recent influx of talent into the division has breathed some new life. The recent addition of Sarita and Hamada to the roster has already paid off with good matches. Alissa Flash has also been a good addition and I thought she outwrestled Sarita in her debut and flew a bit under the radar since they were hyping Sarita. When you add those three women to Tara, Awesome Kong, Raisha Saeed, you have six women who you can rotate over the next few months and have top quality matches. Then when you add Traci Brooks, ODB, Daffney, Velvet Sky, Angelina Love, Christy Hemme, Madison Rayne, and the rest of the women you have more than a dozen women to use.
Now that there is a tag title for the women, TNA can pair one of the stronger performers with someone who might not be as technically sound to accentuate the positives within the team. Last week on Impact, you had a tag tournament match as well as a good match involving Hamada and Daffney so the women’s division was well represented and Tara was not even on the show so they are able to try to establish new stars in addition to someone who might have made their name working in other companies with weekly television.
3. The Tournament for the Main Event at No Surrender
We found out on Thursday night that Kurt Angle will be defending the title in another multi-man match and this time it will be a Four Way Match. While a multi-man match is not always the best match in the ring, it is going to be interesting to see who will join Matt Morgan and Kurt Angle in this match. The brackets for the other two spots were announced after Impact, and thinking of the possibilities had me looking forward to the next few weeks of television leading up to the pay per view.
We will see the following matches to help us find out who those two men are: Sting versus Rhino; Homicide versus Hernandez; A.J. Styles versus Chris Sabin; and Suicide versus Doug Williams.
The first round match that intrigues me the most is Hernandez versus Homicide because of the history they had in LAX and the fact that they have been getting singles pushes with Homicide briefly holding the X Division title and Hernandez’s quest for the TNA Title since he got his briefcase back.
The other bracket can provide us with interesting second round matches. It is possible to have Chris Sabin versus Suicide which would bring us back to the feud that existed when Suicide debuted when Sabin, Shelley, and others thought that Daniels and Suicide were the same person. You could also see Doug Williams versus A.J. Styles which has the potential to be an amazing match if they are given enough time.
4. Spreading the Wealth on Television
One thing that affects my enjoyment of any show is when they try to hammer something down your throat to the point that if you like what they are showing, you start to sour; or if you did not like it, you dislike it even more. For a while, Impact felt like it should have been called the Main Event Mafia Show because it seemed like every segment involved the Main Event Mafia whether it be in the ring, in their locker room, or with their opponents on the pay per view. With so many members and matches on pay per views involving this group, it is understandable, but I thought it was over saturation.
One of the things that I have liked about the last few episodes of Impact is the pacing of the show. The show moved at a pace that was not too fast that you missed things that were important and progressed in a way that built throughout the show. Last week, you had the opening match that saw interference and was turned into a tag match. You also had Matt Morgan with the Main Event Mafia early in the show to build the six man tag match at the end of the night.
If the television is flowing at a better pace, then it might be able to get people to buy the pay per views if they are on the fence because they are given a reason to want to see what happens next.
Again, these are simply a few things that Total Nonstop Action Wrestling has done to enhance my enjoyment of their weekly show.
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