iMPACT Analysis: TNA Against All Odds 2006

Just in time for tonight's version of the show.


Now that we’ve banged out the 2005 version of Against All Odds we move on to a show that took place coincidentally enough 1-year after that show, and amazingly enough 1-year prior to this upcoming one.

What is the iMPACT Analysis? I take a look back at the given event and I try to provide context for each match. Looking at what each participant had been doing prior to their match with their given opponent and I also look at how the result of the match impacted the future direction of the wrestlers, the titles and the promotion as a whole. Then at the end I rate the show on a number of criteria.

All of these are rated on a scale from 0-10.

Wrestling Quality: How was the in-ring action on the show?
Backstage Quality: How were the promos, backstage skits and other angles?
Crowd Heat: Was the crowd in to the show?
Announcing: Were they on point, humorous, say something completely stupid?
Booking: Did the storyline direction make sense? Did the right man or team go over in the end?
iMPACT Analysis: How did this show iMPACT the company? Was it memorable, a complete throwaway, somewhere in the middle?
Replay Factor: How much of this would you ever want to view a second time?
Average: Taking the score in each of the above categories and dividing it by the number of categories and that determines the show score.
Is it worth buying the DVD? Asks if this DVD is worth the purchase or not.

Event: TNA: Against All Odds, 2006
Event Date: 02/12/2006
Event Venue: Universal Studios, Orlando Florida
Announcers: Mike Tenay and Don West

On the Preshow, you would’ve seen…
Ron Killings pinned A-1 (1:43).

Lance Hoyt, Cassidy Riley, & Shark Boy beat Shannon Moore, David Young, & Elix Skipper (5:49) when Hoyt pinned Skipper.
ProWrestlingHistory.com gets the credit for those results, and all match times. They get credit for those preshow results even though it is on this DVD, but if you think I’m watching that you really don’t understand how I work.

This is TNA, the new face of Professional Wrestling…because after Final Resolution we were banned from showing our old face in public. If you need a refresher coarse on how bad that show was, Click here for my review

We see Christian arrive at the building; he guarantees victory in his match tonight. We see Jarrett arriving as well and Eric Young is convinced that Sting is coming back. Young is the first and thus far only member of Team Canada to establish any kind of personality. Jarrett gets Young to repeat, “Sting is gone”, and then D’Amoore lectures Young.

We start the actual show with a video package of Christian and Jarrett. Jarrett calls
Jarrett calls Christian a midcard comedy act, pot I'd like you to meet my friend kettle. Jarrett takes time out from his busy day to remind us that he took Hulk Hogan out even before he could get to TNA. It is weird because in the video to open the preshow the focus was on the X-division title bout, which was not mentioned in the actual show opening video.

Match 1: Austin Aries and Roderick Strong Vs. The Naturals

David Penzer is doing the ring announcing on this show, as Jeremy Borash was shifted to backstage interviewer.

Aries and Strong were victorious at Final Resolution along with Alex Shelley in a 6-man tag, while the Naturals had lost to LAX on the Final Resolution preshow. These teams met in the first round of a tag team tournament to find the #1 contenders for this show and Aries and Strong who were on a nice little roll at this time won that match.

I can tell you for sure one thing I already prefer about the 2006 version of Against All Odds as compared to 2005 is the fact that the show is not split across 2 DVDs. I was glad for the day when TNA discovered duel layer discs.

Tenay says that the Naturals just haven’t had it since they lost the tag titles to AMW in October 2005, (10/22/2005 to be exact) but he’s not telling the truth, this team never had it even when they had the belts. Most ordinary team ever, and I think that may be why they’re called the Naturals.

It is not surprising that this match is not really the formula tag match in the opening. This is an x-division tag match with all the high-flying. The heels have their fan support and all of the early wacky dives have drawn “TNA” chants.

Now we get back to a normal familiar tag match with the heels keeping Chase Stevens, the Blonde Natural for those who know them better as “Blonde hair, and dark haired Natural”, isolated in their half of the ring. Quick tags from the heels, cocky pin attempts off of an elbow from the bottom rope by Aries, all the basics.

Douglas finally gets the hot tag and delivers rights to both Aries and Strong. If I were uncreative, I’d call him a house of fire. As I’m creative person I prefer to refer to him as a dwelling a blaze.

The heels take Stevens out so they can double-team Douglas. A couple of nearfalls soon follow. Stevens finally makes the save. Natural Disaster attempt fails, the heels attempt at using the ropes to cheat like they did in the first match also fails and the Natural Disaster finishes them shortly thereafter.

Winners: The Naturals – 10:29
A fun opening match, but it is too bad the heels were being punished; they were hot and should’ve gone over.

Thumb Position: Slightly up, a fun enough opener considering that it involved the Naturals.

Impact: very mild, The Naturals were nothing but jobbers by the next show while Aries and Strong were suspended for not coming to Orlando the night before and instead working a RoH event. Strong would come back for 1 more match on iMPACT in a world X-cup qualifier and Austin Aries wouldn’t return until October and be repackaged as Austin Starr.

Tenay and West talk about the card for a show we’ve already paid for, that’s one thing TNA does I hate why run down the card of a show I’ve already paid to see. They recap the preshow where Larry Zbyszko guarantees a level playing field for tonight so that the best man will win. Remember this for later, and if you forget don’t worry TNA will be sure to remind you.

Borash is backstage and interviewing America’s Most Wanted. Harris says Sabin and Dutt were impressive in the tournament, defeating all of TNA’s top teams, I should not this was a 4 team tournament. D’Amoore now walks in and Jackie Gayda is there and something is said about demands and now Larry Zbyszko shows up to tell everyone in this segment that anyone that interferes in the main event tonight will be fired on the spot. Keep that in mind, it will be important later. There were only about 8 people in this 1 minute segment and I’ve almost forgotten about it completely 30 seconds later. Not exactly what I consider affective use of time.

Match 2: X-division 4 Way – Petey Williams Vs. Jay Lethal Vs. Alex Shelley Vs. Matt Bentley

Shelley was in the midst of the Paparazzi angle with Sting and was the only one of these 4 with any kind of story. Lethal and Williams didn’t even appear on the Final Resolution Pay Per View show, only the preshow and if you read the opening on the last match, you should know that Bentley was on the losing end of that 6 man tag while Shelley was on the winning end.

Williams and Bentley start things off. I’ll bet its not long before all 4 men end up in the ring.

I used to not be a fan of these multi-man x-division matches that served only to showcase spots, but then I realized that if these matches weren’t on the show, TNA would find something worse to take their place, so I’ll take a match like this over say a VKM and Christy Hemme promo any day.

Crowd is solidly behind Lethal in the early going, even though at this point in TNA Lethal had only done job work. He even draws a “Lethal Weapon” chant. Tenay makes a big deal about the ages of everyone in the match, saying that they average 23 years of age and run the gambit from 26 (Bentley) to 20 (Lethal).

Sure enough it eventually breaks down to all 4 men in the ring.

Finish comes as Petey goes for the Destroyer, but Jackie Gayda comes out and goes for Alex Shelley, this caused Williams to be distracted, and Lethal rolls him up for the pin. I’ll bet trying to follow the Jackie storyline is what distracted Petey.

Winner: Jay Lethal – 10:30
It was fine.

Thumb Position: Slightly up, again a spotfest, which is something, I’d rather see more than most of what TNA is doing now.

Impact: Mild, about all this accomplished was giving Jay Lethal his first real win in TNA.

Borash interviews Rhino. He has no fear and threatens to stuff Jim Mitchell up Abyss’ ass. Larry Z comes in and delivers the message that anyone interfering in the main event will be fired. Got that? Anyone interfering will be fired. Just in case you didn’t get it, Larry repeats it. This could be important.

A video package airs, centering on the James Gang feud with LAX as Ron Killings talks about the Breakup of 3LK as sad music plays in the background. You’ve also got B.G. James protesting about what LAX did to his daddy. They show the clip of where Kip declares he’s got 3 words for us: “Get it, got it, good”. Kip is such a geek.

Match 3: The James Gang Vs. Latin American Xchange (Homicide and Machete) w/Konnan
James Gang defeated the Diamonds in the Rough at Final Resolution while Konnan and Homicide defeated the Naturals. Somewhere after that is when Machete joined LAX to take all of the losses.

I guess 1 reason I like LAX is when you compare LAX now to what they were at the time of this show, they are vastly more awesome. Dropping Machete adding Hernandez changing the music and adding the Spanish intro made the gimmick so much better. Konnan tells B.G. “I did what I did, because it is what I do”. Strangely enough, I completely understand.

B.G. James takes his turn to talk and if you don’t know what he says, I’d like to thank you for discovering professional wrestling on this very day. LAX becomes my favorite team for all-time, all my life because they prevent us from hearing Kip James say anything.

The announcers spend more time recapping the Genesis of this feud so to speak than they do calling the action. I’d like to think it is because this match sucks. West claims some sympathy for Konnan and Tenay gets all huffy.

Konnan does some regular cheating behind the referee’s back. I should not that Konnan is wearing a Raiders Jersey.

The James Gang pin Machete and then don’t get much of a chance to celebrate as Konnan’s slapjack comes in to play. Thankfully, Bob Armstrong comes out to stare down Konnan. Yes, Konnan got intimidated by a 66 year-old man. How LAX was able to get over to any degree considering this was their first feud kind of amazes me.

Winners: The James Gang – 5:59
I've got nothing to say, nothing at all.

Thumb Position: Down, at least this was short.

Impact: Mild, this feud would continue for a few more months much to my disappointment.

Slick Johnson is back with Larry Z and wants to know who will be refereeing the main event tonight. Gee, now they’re making a big deal about who is referee, I wonder if something is up?

Now we move on to the first of 3 title matches.
Chris Sabin hurt his ankle during the finals of the tournament which in Kayfabe terms was the night before on iMPACT but was actually 2 weeks prior at the TV tapings.

Match 4: NWA World Tag Team Titles – Sonjay Dutt and Chris Sabin Vs. America’s Most Wanted
Dutt and Sabin won the #1 contendership by winning a tag team tournament on iMPACT. They defeated Aries and Strong in the finals. AMW had defended the titles successfully against Team 3D at Final Resolution in a match with one of the dumbest finishes ever.

They show the ankle injury and it doesn’t look like anything that felt good. The challengers have separate introductions, could that be a factor? I don’t think so!

Tenay calls AMW the greatest tag team in TNA history. I’m not sure if that is more or less impressive than if I claimed to be the greatest writer in the history of this column.

West and Tenay talk about when they lost respect for AMW; amazingly it was when they turned heel. I wish TNA had a heel announcer sometimes, to offer an alternative viewpoint.

Fans chant, “Kill the Cowboy”, they are begging for illegal activities to be performed. These people are such thugs!

The babyfaces start off in control, but the tide turns when Harris goes after Sabin’s ankle outside the ring.

West complains about AMW working over the ankle. He claims the old AMW would’ve tried to beat them straight up. Curse these men for using a strategy to attack a weak body part, how dare they? It is all the fault of that no-good cheating scoundrel Jeff Jarrett.

Once again we’re back to the tried and true tag formula, the heels working over Sabin’s ankle, keeping him away from his corner, giving him brief hope spots before finally making the hot tag to Dutt.

I’d say Sonjay is a house of fire but in an effort to be creative, he is an abode of flame.

Sonjay uses his quickness to keep control. He even managed to reverse Harris’ Catatonic in to a nearfall. Sabin comes in and hits a tornado DDT on a steel chair that was brought in to play by James Storm. Crowd is definitely in to it.

James Storm has Sabin hurt outside the ring, driving his ankle in to the ring barrier. Shortly thereafter, Sonjay eats the Death Sentence for the pin.

After the match, the handcuffs come in to play. Dutt is handcuffed in the corner, and now they’ve got a chair. Storm wanted to use the beer bottle, but the 1-legged Chris Sabin finally makes the save with the aid of a steel chair.

Winners: America’s Most Wanted – 10:43
I liked the psychology of working over the ankle. The crowd was in to the match and wanted to see the faces win.

Thumb Position: Up, it was a good match with a clean finish, and you sure can’t say that a lot about TNA in 2007.

Impact: None, The match was fine but this wasn’t really a feud and AMW was back in the mix with 3D by the next show. Sabin and Dutt and Lethal were starting to form an alliance of x-division goofs at this point.

Borash is backstage with Jeff Jarrett. Jarrett guarantees that his equalizer and Gail will be enough to make sure he keeps the title. Monty Brown interrupts Jarrett, but Jarrett interrupts Monty’s interruption. Jarrett promises Monty the next title shot after he disposes of Christian Cage. Jarrett insists he never goes against his word, I’m not the type to call someone a liar, but he’s a 2-faced liar.

Next we see a video package for the Falls Count anywhere match between Rhino and Abyss.

Tenay promises that this is your anything goes, falls count anywhere, no disqualification match. I find that funny because I vaguely remember TNA booking a falls count anywhere match that ended in a DQ, it may have been on iMPACT in late 2006 and I’m certain Rhino was involved.

Match 5: Rhino Vs. Abyss

Rhino and Abyss had wrestled at Final Resolution and that match was won by Abyss. They wrestled on iMPACT and neither man claimed victory as a Gore put both men through the wall and that resulted in a no contest and this falls count anywhere match.

We don’t waste time getting to the weapons and outside of the ring. Nothing like starting off by getting straight to the point I always say. Well, I don’t always say it because that’d be kind of boring and repetitive.

David Eckstein is in the crowd, could that be a hint of things to come for 2007? Na, TNA isn’t smart enough to think that far ahead.

The fans sing the Abyss song, and I’ve never figured out what the deal with that is supposed to be.

Abyss sets up a stack of tables in the tunnel area. Rhino goes for a Gore but Abyss stops that with a big boot. The crowd boos because they wanted to see a cool spot. Abyss takes Rhino outside the building briefly and a baseball bat becomes involved. A Trash can is the next thing that Abyss uses in a way other than what it was intended for.

We’re back in the ring area and Abyss has a staple gun which Tenay helpfully reminds us is legal.

Abyss has yet another table that he is setting up. Mitchell gives the “Doomsday” signal. Abyss hits a chokeslam on Rhino through the table and that gets him a 2 count. Now Abyss goes for the thumbtacks, but before he can use them, he eats a Gore from Rhino for 2. Crowd chants, “This is awesome”, and I don’t necessarily disagree.

Now Rhino and Abyss are fighting up into the stands. They are busting through the side of the wall, and Abyss is using the piece of the wall as a weapon. I’m thinking of Pink Floyd right now and shouldn’t need to explain why, but for those that don’t get it, we’ve got another break in the wall.

Abyss is going to chokeslam Rhino through the tables, which happened to be under the break in the wall, Rhino blocks with a kick and then Gores Abyss off of the bleachers through the double stack of tables, and gets the pin. It looked good but was safer than you’d probably assume.

Winner: Rhino – 15:25
You know why I liked this match? It is the only match of its kind on this card, it is not sandwiched by a chain match and a casket match and a street fight, and it is the only weapons filled match on the show. It is a novel concept but sometimes less really is more.

Thumb Position: Up, a nice fun wild brawl that was as I said different than anything else we’ve seen on this show.

Impact: almost major, the feud was continued for another month, but this was technically the blowoff to the singles feud as at Destination X they were on opposite sides of an 8-man tag.

Borash is backstage with Samoa Joe. It was with this show that I realized that Samoa Joe could really cut good promos.

We go back to the arena, and Abyss is being attended to after the match. They replay the big finish. Abyss finally starts moving and the crowd starts to cheer. See if Russo did this, they would’ve cut away and not shown any replays. So I give them credit for trying to sell the importance of the spot.

Next up is a video package for the 3-way X-division title bout. The other reason I don’t recap the preshow aside the fact that they’re boring is that the video packages are repeated here.

Match 6: NWA X-Division Title – Christopher Daniels Vs. AJ Styles Vs. Samoa Joe

Joe defeated Daniels at Final Resolution when AJ threw the towel in on behalf of Daniels. Styles was ruled top contender, but Daniels disagreed so Larry Zbyszko declared we’d have another 3-way bout which was a rematch of there first one at Unbreakable 2005 on 09/11/2005. Also, at 2005’s Turning Point event in December, Samoa Joe initially captured the X-division title from AJ Styles. In other words their fates are intertwined.

Early sequences of the match involve all 3 men hitting moves on each other and breaking up pins and preventing each other from hitting moves on the third man. Nothing as great as the spot in the first 3-way where Joe and Styles take turns kicking Daniels until he yells out: “Stop kicking me!”

First person to be taken out is Styles, and then Joe goes to work on Daniels. Knife edge chops, running knee to the head and then the face wash. Then AJ attacks Joe and they have a brief exchange. Daniels tries to suplex Joe out of the ring, AJ runs and Joe ducks and AJ takes Daniels down to the floor. The 2 of them fight on the floor and Joe decides to have fun so he dives through the ropes on to both men. Joe tosses Daniels back in the ring to continue the punishment.

This may be my hearing playing tricks on me but I could swear that we had the crowd chanting, “This is Awesome”, followed by this 1 guy chanting “No it ain’t”. If so, that is so awesome that words just don’t do it justice and if not, one day this needs to happen.

Joe has pretty much been kicking the hell out of both guys for a majority of this one. AJ cuts Joe off from hitting a muscle buster

Daniels hits Joe with a vicious release German dropping him right on his head. A BME gets 2 for Daniels. Daniels is a foolish man as he yells out Angel’s Wings, thus telling everyone what he’s planning next including his opponent. Needless to say, he is unable to hit it. AJ is the next man to get a flurry of offense hitting both men with a series of kicks, and then a gutbuster for Daniels. That gets a 2 for AJ who then goes for the torture wrack, which is broken up by Joe.

AJ tries the Clash on Joe but Daniels cuts it off. Joe gets dropped on his head again and both Styles and Daniels make pin attempts. AJ finds himself on the top rope, but that’s bad news for him because Joe hooks him and hits the muscle buster and that my friends, is that.

Winner: Samoa Joe – 10:06
Not as good as the initial 3-way from Unbreakable 2005 but miles ahead of most anything else TNA produced in 2006 not involving Kurt Angle and Samoa Joe.

Thumb Position: Way up, Hey I’d happily watch this match over and over again without complaint.

Impact: Less than you’d expect from a title match with a clean pin, the feud went on for another month or so culminating with Ultimate X at Destination X.

Now we get a video package for the Team 3D Vs. Team Canada match including the fans deciding whom 3D should go after between the Canadians and AMW in an Internet vote.

Borash is with Team 3D. Brother Ray gets cheap heat by claiming the U.S. will kick Canada’s ass in Olympic hockey. Apparently, Team Canada has pissed off the entire United States. Ray says tonight there are 3 guarantees in life: Death, taxes and tables. He asks Team Canada to guess which is theirs but theoretically if they’re all guaranteed aren’t they all eventually going to go to Team Canada anyway? I put the early money on taxes.

Match 7: Team 3D Vs. Team Canada (Bobby Roode and Eric Young)

This match came about because of the role Team Canada played in the stupid finish to the tag title match at Final Resolution.

Everyone that usually watches these shows over here loves it when Eric Young is frightened by his pyro. The fight starts on the ramp which Bobby Roode is backdropped right through.

Crowd chants “USA” and “We want tables”, and Tenay helpfully tells that they weren’t chanting for death or taxes. I demand a “We want taxes”, chant right now that would be so great.

In order to show you how interested in this match I am, I’ve spent a good portion of the heat segment reading about the NFL’s pro Bowl which took place last night and I did not know that until last night. Best Pro Bowl moment ever was when Kevin Gogan of San Francisco and Neil Smith of Denver got ejected for fighting, that was more awesome than this match.

You know what snapped me back in to it? Mike Tenay talking about Eric Young using a camel clutch. I can safely tell you that D-von’s back was not broken and thankfully his ass was not fucked.

Ray finally gets the hot tag and I don’t want to say he is a house of fire so I’ll instead tell you that he was an apartment of inferno.

Ray suplexes Young off of the middle rope for 2, the suplex was not a setup for Ray’s own camel clutch. Roode broke up the pin.

A 3D was hit and not by the Canadians, and the pin was scored.

D’Amoore and AMW come in before 3D can use the table.

Question, why is it that whenever post match extra activities take place the timekeeper always repeatedly rings the bell? Does he really think that will get them to stop?

Ron Killings is the one who makes the save for 3D and that would lead to a match on Destination X 2006 which is not nearly as horrid as the 2005 version.

Winners: Team 3D – 13:12
This match had to follow the 3-way and well it was put in the death slot.

Thumb Position: In the Middle, it was ok but a bit of the whatever.

Impact: Mild, believe it or not this didn’t end the feud between these 2 teams even though 3D would be back wrestling AMW next month. It was weird as they really had 2 feuds going at once but not really since AMW and the Canadians were apart of Jarrett’s stable.

Don West and Mike Tenay spend a few moments to hype up the main event.

Borash is backstage with Christian Cage. Hey, that rhymes. Christian takes a long pause before starting to talk. He cuts a fired up babyface promo and will win the title because that’s how he roles. Oh, and he made fun of the way Jeff Jarrett dresses.

The video package that aired to open the show airs here as well.

Match 8: NWA World Heavyweight Championship – Christian Cage Vs. Jeff Jarrett

Sting had “retired” after the victory he and Christian enjoyed at Final Resolution and a top contender to the world title was needed. As Christian had won a #1 contenders match at Turning Point to end 2005 over Monty Brown, he was given the shot.

Earl Hebner is the referee, whom the announcers draw attention to, it seems that Earl has some controversial decisions in his past. I may have to investigate this, as I’m not really sure what they could be referring to when they say that. I think it had something to do with a series of 97 survivors, perhaps he was supposed to tape them but forgot to set the VCR. Rest assured I’ll find out and let you know later.

Now remember because it is important that you remember that anyone interfering in this match will be fired on the spot. I cannot tell you how important that is to keep in mind.

Even Dave Hebner, and Larry Zbyszko get introductions they come out with Earl.

Tenay says that Jarrett has been NWA champion for 2 and a half years of the 4-year history of TNA. It is a good thing he doesn’t obsess about holding that belt.

Borash does the boxing/UFC style intros and Earl Hebner gets a second introduction.

The match hasn’t started yet and the crowd is chanting, “Please retire”, at Jarrett. Sometimes, I love these people and this is one of those times.

After a prolonged stare down, the bell finally rings.

A few minutes in to the match, Christian’s wife is shown at ringside. Hmmm, kind of makes me wonder if there might be some sort of celebration coming soon.

Jarrett controls most of the early going and does so without crowd brawling. A key moment comes when Christian puts Jarrett in the figure 4, the crowd immediately chants, “tap tap tap”, and Gail helps Jarrett reach the ropes. Yes, Gail Kim interfered and West was wondering if it was really behind the referee’s back. The fans are on top of things and chant: “Fire Gail”. I can confirm that she was not fired, and that if she had been I could’ve found her a job.

Then it happens. Jeff Jarrett locks Christian in the sharp shooter. Christian insists that Earl not call for the bell. Now why would Earl do that if Christian hasn’t submitted? That’d just be a mean thing to do to screw a man over like that, and I can’t even begin to speculate why they’d consider Earl Hebner a likely candidate to do such a thing.

After another minute or so Christian has escaped the Sharp Shooter and hits the DDT for a nearfall. Shortly thereafter, Earl takes a pretty weak bump. Christian goes up top and Gail Kim again interferes. Jeff Jarrett hits a stroke off of the top rope. Jarrett goes for a pin but due to Earl’s ankle injury it only gets a 2 count.

Now Earl gets wiped out but good and Christian hits the Unprettier. Earl being out allows Slick Johnson to hit the ring and he counts a 2 for Christian.

Slick was going to DQ Jarrett for something so Jarrett just decks him. Gail brings in a chair but it backfires as Christian dropkicks it in to his face. Christian is now chasing Gail around the ring and he captures her. This allows Jarrett to crack Christian in the head with the guitar. Gail sweeps up the evidence and we still have no ref. Earl finally revives but Christian gets out at the last second.

Jarrett distracts the ref, Gail up top powerbombed off by Christian, Jarrett goes for the Unprettier, reversed by Christian who tries his own Stroke, Jarrett lands on his feet but Christian hits the Unprettier for the 1…2…3! As the crowd goes crazy over the fact that Jarrett is not the champion anymore.

Winner: Christian Cage – 16:14
I wish we had gotten more of a clean finish without as much of the Jarrett standard, but the visual of the fans all jumping in the ring at the end to celebrate was memorable. TNA would start the process of screwing it all up at the next set of TV tapings although if you wanted to argue that they started to screw up Christian’s title reign before he won the belt I wouldn’t loudly protest.

Thumb Position: Slightly up, it is hard to forgive all of the Gail interference when they made such a big deal out of it, but if she comes over later we can get started. The match was fine, and the ending visual was definitely cool if only for that fleeting moment.

Impact: Major, but not necessarily in a good way. Christian as champion would still play second fiddle to whatever Jarrett was doing. Combine that with the fact that Christian as a face just wasn’t going to work anyway, but I don’t blame them for trying, and you have a rather obvious failure on your hands. This was the beginning of that failure.

Overall Show Thoughts:
This was a pretty good show overall. It didn’t have the bad booking that plagues a lot of these shows, no really horrible finishes and some good wrestling action.

The Scoring:

Wrestling Quality: 8, only 1 clunker of a match and at least it was kept short.

Backstage Quality: 4, we had some good promos but I can’t forgive the big deal that was made about interfering only to see Gail interfere 6 times.

Crowd Heat: 7, they were a good crowd on this night, didn’t start “This is awesome”, chants 30 seconds in to matches and didn’t make me want TNA to leave Orlando and never return.

Announcing: 3, it was definitely not the best days for either Tenay or West.

Booking: 7, other than the nonsense in the main event we largely had clean finishes with a minimal amount of interference. There was no “What the hell were they thinking?” moment for me watching this show so that’s a definite plus.

IMPACT Analysis: 3, most of that score goes to Jarrett and Christian. The major problem I had with most TNA Pay Per Views at this time is that while I thought most were good, I didn’t think any of them felt like they ended anything or even that they made you want to know what was going to happen next. It’s funny because I’d give anything to have that be my only real beef with TNA shows these days, I’d gladly trade back up to this problem from where we are now.

Replay Factor: 8, overall I loved this show and would gladly watch it again.

Average: 5.7, I’ve rated 4 shows on this scale as of this writing and this has scored the best so far.

Is it worth buying the DVD? Yes, there is some good stuff here. It is hard to believe that the same creative team put together Final Resolution 06, which I hated so much, and this show, which I enjoyed so much.