TNA IMPACT WORKRATE REPORT EPISODE #49

WHAT WORKED:

THE MACK BROTHERS~!!! HOLY SHIT!!! Who are these guys??? Last weeks show I went into a long involved thing about this promotions poor use of jobbers and then they go and bring out these crazy fucks who take every single bump in the biggest most painful way possible. I've said again and again that I'm tired of squash matches but if you're going to run squashes you need to do them right. And this was doing a squash right. I need to see more of the fucking MACK BROTHERS!!!!

Hey the X Division guys are watching Jackass to train for their future matches. AWESOME!!! I mean they're going to fuck this up but the thing about Jackass is that those guys actually know how to sell big spots. Each skit/ match builds to one big spot, spot is sold as something that hurts and skit is over. None of the no-selling stringing of meaningless spots together that the X division guys tend to do. Big spots lead directly to finishes. You can see why Jerry Lynn doesn't understand this.

Speaking of comedy skits: TNA does the sports entertainment right!!! HOLY SHIT, when did TNA figure out how to do sports entertainment this well? the problem with allot of the McMahon/Russo sports entertainment philosophy was always pretty obvious. "No one wants to see long wrestling matches so we'll give them short wrestling matches and long skits" fails to recognize that most wrestlers can't pull off long skits. Hell most SNL professional comedians can't pull off long skits. End result was you had a lot of wrestling programming built around one joke skits stretched too long. That's painful enough on SNL but especially bad on show without professional actors. Somehow someone in TNA figured this out. And so this week was filled with quick two minute skits. You set up premise and deliver the punch line and then stop...skit over. The Slick Johnson skit was kept to a quick visual bit with no dialogue and Don West narration. Jeremy Borash never opened his mouth he just was guy holding the mic. Shane Douglas and Naturals stuff is dumb but kept quick and to the point. Bobby Heenan is completely washed up at this point but segment got point across quickly. The X division guys backstage watching Jackass got the point across and was over. All of the Jarrett and Eric Young segments were perfect as they just got the joke over and never tried to stretch the little bits out too long. The short spots all lead to the big piece at the end with Cornette doing matchmaking. Cornette is great in that role and the fan lumberjack match was sold well as you transitioned form the comedy into the danger. Jarrett and Young played their roles with him well. Just all the comedy/sports entertainment came off as really well done and efficient.

WHAT DIDN'T WORK:

While everything else was efficient, you couldn't have made that Raven/James Mitchell segment short enough not to be embarrasing. Both guys depend on meandering Dungeons and Dragons mic work...and the combo of both in same promotional package made me long for the Raven's mom angle.

Matches weren't really any good. James Gang/with Smiley and Shark Boy vs. AMW and Bentley/Kazarian was about two minutes long and still messy. The Christian vs. Killings match had some interesting ideas. Christian was really fun in role of guy in showcase matches on RAW. He played weak heel who did allot of Terry Funk shtick and bumping, had a nice Anaconda vice, and an over out of nowhere finisher. He came into TNA as a guy positioned on top and has never really figured out how to work from on top in TNA. Never figured out how to work as not-weak guy. Never figured out how to work as strong face. Here he's back to working as a heel. But instead of working as a weak heel he tried to work as strong one and he had some interesting ideas on how to pull it off, how much to give Killings and when to cut him off. the Tomakaze has always been an out of nowhere finisher. Finisher that you don't need to build to and it's a believable head dropping finisher. Here Christian builds all of his offense around working the upper body and neck attacks. Came back on offense through lariats, snapmares, neckbreakers, rope assisted sling blade, neck vises, etc. And you got the sense that he might be a guy who can figure out how to work heel from the top. Or he might make a great Tom Pritchard tag partner. After all that match is won with a spear and really the match was bad but you still got the impression that Christian is a guy who might potentially figure out how to be effective in TNA. Still match stank.