When the odds are stacked against you, there is nothing like outworking, outdoing, and transcending your competition. In our meritocracy, there is no greater achievement than being an underdog in a poor disposition and reaching within you and marshaling the will, learning the skill, and mustering the strength to succeed. On August 14, TNA did just that, and I couldn’t bear to let it go by without mention.
While WWE assembled the pieces to the chaotic jigsaw puzzle that is Summerslam, a show that despite a roster of fresh feuds and huge matches justifies only a yawn for its creative efforts, Samoa Joe and AJ Styles were wrestling their career defining match.
As New Japan blindly stumbled through one of their most unsuccessful G-1 Climax tournaments in history, erstwhile their year’s gem of an event but now low lighted by Masa Chono’s fifth win because that is all the company could come up with for the future, a roster full of determined athletes of different strengths and abilities worked with full steam to produce an event that puts all pay per view events this year to shame.
The odds are against the company but the August 14 TNA PPV was a message that TNA is on the acclivity of its brightest day and they’re more prepared than ever before for the challenges that lay ahead.
There used to be a quiet but dignified guarantee that, even when WWE’s PPVs were booked poorly, the roster was the best in the world, the most qualified in the world, the best trained in the world, and the hardest working in the world.
Somewhere in between the diluted PPVs that come with rapid frequency and the lower standards of work impressed upon WWE competitors, slowly, but surely, the company lost that badge of honor. The Great American Bash served to remind us that the worst was more than capable; Vengeance reminded us that the best was seemingly only capable with hotshotted angles and the competitive quality from the ECW PPV fourteen days earlier.
The problems were apparent in TNA’s product: most notably, Jeff Jarrett’s continued presence as the company’s top star is both unnecessary and subtractive. But the problems were fewer than they had ever been before and the booking, now done by a committee led by Scott D’Amore, is both wise and effective. Those two qualities were only in rare spurts attributable to the TNA product of the past.
The highlight, however, were the wrestlers on the card. They worked hard, there wasn’t one bad match, and the standard of the work was on par with WWE PPVs. It wasn’t a fluke achievement though, as this was only one in a line of very good to excellent PPVs from TNA, and this was the most consistent.
Samoa Joe vs. AJ Styles was the strongest match on the card. Joe is the best brawler in the business. Bruiser Brody would be proud of his realistic, polished, and psychological prowess. He has also improved since coming into TNA. Styles is, well, Styles, which is a lofty compliment. The booking of end of the match was murky and the match didn’t go long enough. Despite this, it was among the best American matches of the year, although not the caliber of Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Michaels. As mentioned, nothing was bad, but other notable matches were Jerry Lynn vs. Sean Waltman and Christopher Daniels vs. the new Austin Aries.
When the best weekly TV show is Ohio Valley Wrestling and the best PPV is Total Nonstop Action, it is past time for the establishment to rethink the very character of the product they produce.
TNA’s next PPV is September 11. They debut Impact on October 1 on SpikeTV.
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