Television Coverage: TNA Impact 11/16/2006

I didn't do a live blog of the show because I've got 2 of those this weekend and haven't been feeling at full strength the past couple of days hense no updates yesterday and only a couple today.

So we'll just look at the things on this show that I liked and things I didn't:



What did I like?

• There was some good wrestling on the show, I enjoyed both Rhino Vs. Christian and the Angle Vs. Abyss main event. I thought that those were both enjoyable matches that you don't see enough of on TV these days.
  
• I liked the video packages for Sting, Kurt Angle, Samoa Joe, Abyss, the X-division. I liked these even though as a follower of this product I already know who these guys are. TNA decided to treat this as though there were a bunch of people that were going to watch this show that hadn't seen it before and quite some time. I don't think that assessment is correct, but having said that I like that they did it anyway. It showed a focus and may have given someone or some people reason to care about whomever was the focus of the video. I'd like to see these more often but also include a tale of the tape type thing or what have you to provide extra info.
  
• Focus on the Pay Per View. I like that going in to this show we only knew 3 matches for Genesis. Sting Vs. Abyss, LAX Vs. AMW and Angle Vs. Joe. I don't believe in this day and age that you have to devote a lot of TV time to whatever ends up being the opening match on the next PPV. UFC is hyping 2 matches for a PPV on Saturday and its really just 1 match that people are clammering to see. We did get 2 more matches added during the show.
  
• The Naturals segment. I liked this better in the spoiler report where they beat Team 3D down further after the match. I like that they're starting to become something other than Chase Stevens and Andy Douglas the wrestlers.
  
• It was a simple straight forward night. I wouldn't always put this fact in to the liked column but after wacky battle royals and stage 3 tournaments and objects on polls I'll take the basics any day and a lot of what we saw tonight was simple straight forward and could be explained in just a few seconds. A few things weren't so straight forward and they'll be listed in a different category.

What I didn't like:

• Bad comedy: Kevin Nash and his 2 sidekicks did very little to entertain me. The Eric Young thing was I guess it was mildly entertaining he first time when he thought LAX were snipers.
  
• VKM Vs. VKM: Yeah, you had to know this would end up here if you've read my stuff for any length of time. I don't like it because this is so 1998. I don't like it for the same reasons I don't like DX but this is even more lame. Calling Michaels and HHH by their real names isn't edgy its look at how cute we are. It can't really have a payoff. How as a fan am I supposed to know that this war is over? Is WWE going to invade and lose in a co-promoted show? Why should any of the TNA wrestlers care about the VKM's war with WWE? That's just a few of the ways in which this is stupid and a bad idea.
  
• Changing the x-title. They've already done this twice since Bound for Glory. It is like the IC title on Raw apparently.
  
• Petey Williams face turn. I don't like this because of the fact that it came out of no where. I guess that's Russo trying to swerve us, but what before tonight has Petey Williams done to even give us a hint that this is coming? It would be like if you were watching Shrek and all of a sudden Shrek turned in to Homer Simpson. Sure, it would be a cute joke, probably even shock the audience but how many people would be saying at the end that it was something that made sense?
  
• There is 1 problem I have with the LAX Vs. AMW feud up to this point. LAX is looking out for the immigrants or so they say. But they attacked someone a few weeks ago who would seem to fit the category of the type of person they're supposed to stand up for. Gail Kim would probably qualify as an immigrant no? If you say that they are only standing for the Latinos then why did Konnan invite Petey Williams to the flag burning, and offer to let him burn the flag?
  
• LAX burning the American flag. Its a way to get cheap heat and I think they're better than that, but they're obviously not the first to go this direction in wrestling. I seem to remember that the Unamericans threatened to burn the flag in Madison Square Garden during the summer of 2002.

Overall: This is easily the best Impact I've had to cover for the OCC. When this show was over I remembered a lot of it, I thought the time flew quickly and nothing left me scratching my head and wondering what they were talking about. This show would've pretty much been perfect had it not been for the VKM thing. Everything else on the hate list is something I can at least tolerate and I've probably seen worse than what I got tonight in a lot of those cases. But, no good will come from the VKM transformation.

I give this show a 7.5 out of 10.